Home About us Contact
|
Home About us Contact | ||
|
|
||
Health Equity (health + equity)
Selected AbstractsHealth Action Zones: Partnerships for Health EquityHEALTH & SOCIAL CARE IN THE COMMUNITY, Issue 4 2006Andrea Wild Dr No abstract is available for this article. [source] Health Interventions and Health Equity: The Example of Measles Vaccination in BangladeshPOPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW, Issue 2 2001Michael A. Koenig Although the existence of socioeconomic differentials in infant and childhood mortality in developing countries is well established. little consensus exists as to the most effective approaches to reducing such differentials. This article utilizes longitudinal data from the Matlab study area in rural Bangladesh to investigate the impact of an efficacious child survival intervention,measles vaccination,on reductions in gender and socioeconomic differentials in childhood mortality. The article analyzes data from 16,270 vaccinated children and randomly matched controls, and evaluates their subsequent mortality risks. Proportional hazards analysis demonstrates that unvaccinated children from very poor families face more than a threefold higher risk of subsequent early child mortality, compared to vaccinated children from families of high economic status. While measles vaccination has little impact on mortality risks among children of higher economic status, the improvement in survival among children from poorer households is pronounced. The provision of measles vaccination markedly reduces mortality risks for poorer children,from over three times higher to just over 1.5 times higher relative to vaccinated children from wealthier families. The findings of this study are evaluated in terms of the potential of child survival interventions such as measles vaccination to promote greater health equity. [source] Achieving Health Equity on a Global Scale through a Community-Based, Public Health Framework for ActionTHE JOURNAL OF LAW, MEDICINE & ETHICS, Issue 3 2010Laura Anderko Despite good intentions and decades of discussion addressing the need for transformative changes globally to reduce poverty and improve health equity, little progress has been made. A fundamental shift in framing the current conversation is critical to achieve "health for all," moving away from the traditional approaches that use the more narrowly focused medical model, which is intent on treating and curing disease. A public health framework for action is needed, which recognizes and confronts the complex, and often-times difficult-to-achieve social determinants of health. A restructuring of global health policy development and implementation will be ineffective unless key areas are addressed including primary education and the environment, in addition to economic considerations. A public health framework that embraces a community-based participatory approach would provide a comprehensive platform for identifying critical components that impact health, and for developing effective strategies for change. A participatory approach would encourage dialogue and problem-solving for region-specific issues among those most affected by the broader health and social justice issues, with those who create policy. [source] Social Justice as a Wider Lens of Support for Childbearing WomenJOURNAL OF OBSTETRIC, GYNECOLOGIC & NEONATAL NURSING, Issue 3 2010M. Cynthia Logsdon ABSTRACT The ecological model is used as a framework for applying social justice concepts to the care of childbearing women and families. In this model, the environment of childbearing women has 3 distinct levels: macrosystem, mesosystem, and microsystem. Two scenarios are described and examples of nursing actions to promote social justice at each level are provided. This article demonstrates how maternal/infant nursing practice can be expanded to promote health equities, social justice, and support. [source] Continuing nursing education policy in China and its impact on health equityNURSING INQUIRY, Issue 3 2010Lily Dongxia Xiao XIAO LD. Nursing Inquiry 2010; 17: 208,220 Continuing nursing education policy in China and its impact on health equity The aim of this study was to evaluate the mandatory continuing nursing education (MCNE) policy in China and to examine whether or not the policy addresses health equity. MCNE was instituted in 1996 in China to support healthcare reform was to include producing greater equity in health-care. However, the literature increasingly reports inequity in participation in MCNE, which is likely to have had a detrimental effect on the pre-existing discrepancies of education in the nursing workforce, and thereby failing to really address health equity. Despite a growing appeal for change, there is lack of critical reflection on the issues of MCNE policy. Critical ethnography underpinned by Habermas' Communicative Action Theory and Giddens' Structuration Theory were used to guide this study. Findings are presented in four themes: (i) inaccessibility of learning programs for nurses; (ii) undervaluation of workplace-based learning; (iii) inequality of the allocation of resources; and (iv) demands for additional support in MCNE from non-tertiary hospitals. The findings strongly suggest the need for an MCNE policy review based on rational consensus with stakeholders while reflecting the principles of health equity. [source] The exodus of health professionals from sub-Saharan Africa: balancing human rights and societal needs in the twenty-first centuryNURSING INQUIRY, Issue 2 2007Linda Ogilvie Increased international migration of health professionals is weakening healthcare systems in low-income countries, particularly those in sub-Saharan Africa. The migration of nurses, physicians and other health professionals from countries in sub-Saharan Africa poses a major threat to the achievement of health equity in this region. As nurses form the backbone of healthcare systems in many of the affected countries, it is the accelerating migration of nurses that will be most critical over the next few years. In this paper we present a comprehensive analysis of the literature and argue that, from a human rights perspective, there are competing rights in the international migration of health professionals: the right to leave one's country to seek a better life; the right to health of populations in the source and destination countries; labour rights; the right to education; and the right to nondiscrimination and equality. Creative policy approaches are required to balance these rights and to ensure that the individual rights of health professionals do not compromise the societal right to health. [source] Health Interventions and Health Equity: The Example of Measles Vaccination in BangladeshPOPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW, Issue 2 2001Michael A. Koenig Although the existence of socioeconomic differentials in infant and childhood mortality in developing countries is well established. little consensus exists as to the most effective approaches to reducing such differentials. This article utilizes longitudinal data from the Matlab study area in rural Bangladesh to investigate the impact of an efficacious child survival intervention,measles vaccination,on reductions in gender and socioeconomic differentials in childhood mortality. The article analyzes data from 16,270 vaccinated children and randomly matched controls, and evaluates their subsequent mortality risks. Proportional hazards analysis demonstrates that unvaccinated children from very poor families face more than a threefold higher risk of subsequent early child mortality, compared to vaccinated children from families of high economic status. While measles vaccination has little impact on mortality risks among children of higher economic status, the improvement in survival among children from poorer households is pronounced. The provision of measles vaccination markedly reduces mortality risks for poorer children,from over three times higher to just over 1.5 times higher relative to vaccinated children from wealthier families. The findings of this study are evaluated in terms of the potential of child survival interventions such as measles vaccination to promote greater health equity. [source] Global Health Governance: Commission on Social Determinants of Health and the Imperative for ChangeTHE JOURNAL OF LAW, MEDICINE & ETHICS, Issue 3 2010Ruth Bell In May 2009 the World Health Assembly passed a resolution on reducing health inequities through action on the social determinants of health, based on the work of the global Commission on Social Determinants of Health, 2005,2008. The Commission's genesis and findings raise some important questions for global health governance. We draw out some of the essential elements, themes, and mechanisms that shaped the Commission. We start by examining the evolving nature of global health and the Commission's foundational inspiration , the universal pattern of health inequity and the imperative, driven by a sense of social justice, to make better and more equal health a global goal. We look at how the Commission was established, how it was structured internally, and how it developed external relationships , with the World Health Organization, with global networks of academics and practitioners, with country governments eager to spearhead action on health equity, and with civil society. We outline the Commission's recommendations as they relate to the architecture of global health governance. Finally, we look at how the Commission is catalyzing a movement to bring social determinants of health to the forefront of international and national policy discourse. [source] Achieving Health Equity on a Global Scale through a Community-Based, Public Health Framework for ActionTHE JOURNAL OF LAW, MEDICINE & ETHICS, Issue 3 2010Laura Anderko Despite good intentions and decades of discussion addressing the need for transformative changes globally to reduce poverty and improve health equity, little progress has been made. A fundamental shift in framing the current conversation is critical to achieve "health for all," moving away from the traditional approaches that use the more narrowly focused medical model, which is intent on treating and curing disease. A public health framework for action is needed, which recognizes and confronts the complex, and often-times difficult-to-achieve social determinants of health. A restructuring of global health policy development and implementation will be ineffective unless key areas are addressed including primary education and the environment, in addition to economic considerations. A public health framework that embraces a community-based participatory approach would provide a comprehensive platform for identifying critical components that impact health, and for developing effective strategies for change. A participatory approach would encourage dialogue and problem-solving for region-specific issues among those most affected by the broader health and social justice issues, with those who create policy. [source] Unfettered Consumer Access to Affordable Therapies in the Post-TRIPS Era: A Dead-End Journey for Patients?THE JOURNAL OF WORLD INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY, Issue 3 2010India Case Studies, Kenya Increasing access to essential medicines has become an international priority, given the rapid spread of intractable diseases such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. It follows that the quests to improve the global quality of healthcare and achieve health equity present a challenge for many countries, especially those that have been hard hit by deadly pandemics and whose populations are also still without essential drugs. Consequently, many countries have stepped up efforts to remove the obstacles to the availability and affordability of essential medicines. The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) contains flexibilities that can be used as tools for enhancing access to cheap medicines and for controlling drug pricing. However, these flexibilities are not necessarily a panacea and cannot singly solve the problem of limited access to essential medicines. Put differently, cheaper medicines cannot reach the poor without the infrastructure to deliver them. For this to become a reality, commitment on the part of the member countries to adopt comprehensive and cooperative measures to tackle the burdensome barriers that limit access to critical medicines is needed. It is only then that the flexibilities in TRIPS can be optimized and a real difference made in the lives of poor patients across the developing world. [source] | |||||||||||||