Transforming the Quality of Health Care in Ethiopia
The WHO Quality Health Services: a planning guide focuses on actions required at the national, district and facility levels to enhance quality of health services, providing guidance on implementing
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key activities at each of these three levels. It highlights the need for a health systems approach to enhance quality of care, with a common understanding on the activities needed by all stakeholders. The guide articulates the key actions required to improve the quality of health services for the entire population. It recognizes that the path varies for each country, district and facility – stimulating the reader to consider multiple factors and entry points for action. This planning guide is for staff working at all levels of the health system (i.e. national, district and facility) who have a role in enhancing the quality of health services. It is also relevant to all stakeholders initiating and supporting action at facility, district and/or national levels both in the public and private sectors.
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DHS Methodological Report No. 20
This study used Service Provision Assessment (SPA) and Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) data from Haiti, Malawi, and Tanzania to compare traditionally used additive methods with a data reduction method—principal component analysis (PCA).
We scored
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the quality of health facilities with three approaches (simple additive, weighted additive, and PCA) for two constructs: quality of services, with only facilities-level data, and quality of care, which incorporates observation and client data. We ranked facilities as high, medium, or low quality based on their scores. Our results indicated that the rankings change with the scoring methodology. There was more consistency in the rankings of facilities by the simple additive and PCA methods than the weighted additive and PCA-based rankings. This may be due to the low factor loadings and little variance explained by the first component in the PCA. We aggregated facility scores to their respective DHS clusters (Haiti, Malawi) or regions (Tanzania) and geographically linked them to women interviewed in DHS surveys to test associations between the use of family planning services and the quality environment, as measured with each index.
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A practical approach for developing policy and strategy to improve quality of care
The handbook outlines an approach for the development of national policies and strategies to improve the quality
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of care. Such policy and strategy can help clarify the structures, roles and responsibilities within national quality efforts, support the institutionalization of a culture of quality, and secure buy-in from health system leaders and stakeholders
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Poor quality health services are holding back progress on improving health in countries at all income levels.
Today, inaccurate diagnosis, medication errors, inappropriate or unnecessary treatment, inadequate or unsafe clinical facilities or pr
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actices, or providers who lack adequate training and expertise prevail in all countries.
The situation is worst in low and middle-income countries where 10 percent of hospitalized patients can expect to acquire an infection during their stay, as compared to seven percent in high income countries. This is despite hospital acquired infections being easily avoided through better hygiene, improved infection control practices and appropriate use of antimicrobials.. At the same time, one in ten patients is harmed during medical treatment in high income countries.
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In fragile, conflict-affected and vulnerable settings, delivery of quality health services faces significant challenges, including disruption of a routine health service organization and delivery systems, increased health needs, complex and unpredic
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table resourcing issues, and vulnerability to multiple public health crises. Despite the difficulty of addressing quality in such settings, the necessity for action is acute, given the significant health needs of the populations in these environments and the increasing numbers of people for whom such settings are home.
This manual has been developed to provide a starting point for multi-actor efforts and actions to address quality of care in the most challenging settings. This includes practical approaches to action planning and implementation of a contextualised set of quality interventions.
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Empowering Health Workers to Improve Service Delivery. This training program is designed to build the capacity of program managers and health providers in quality management, and improve the provision of high-
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quality health services.
Please download the chapters directly from the website: https://www.usaidassist.org/resources/kenya-quality-model-health-training-course-health-sector
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The WHO Quality Toolkit: Navigating tools to improve the quality of health services helps easy identification and access to a wide range of WHO published materials to improve the
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quality of health services. These tools support the actions described in the Quality health services: a planning guide, which outlines a structured, systems-based approach to improving quality of health services. Whether you work at the facility, sub-national or national level, or in specific communities, you will find resources within the Quality Toolkit to help you carry out essential tasks to improve quality of care
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For the Assesor's Guide Vol 1 and 2 see: nrhm.gov.in/images/pdf/programmes/maternal-health/guidelines/Operational_Guidelines_for_Quality_Assurance_in_Public_Health_Facilities_and_checklists-3_books.zip
As countries commit to achieving universal health coverage, it is imperative to ensure that the design and delivery of palliative care services place attention on quality of care, with action needed across all domains of
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quality health services: effectiveness, safety, people-centredness, timeliness, equity, integration and efficiency. Providing compassionate, dignified and people-centred palliative care is an ethical responsibility of health systems.
This document provides a practical resource to support implementation of sustainable improvements in the quality of palliative care. It describes approaches to quality policy, strategy and planning for palliative care programmes and services, presents learning on quality of care arising from palliative care programmes, and offers considerations on measurement of quality palliative care services at all levels of the health system. The document also highlights relevant WHO resources available that further support the development of quality palliative care services.
The audience for this document is a general one that includes policy-makers, palliative care service planners, managers, practitioners and health care providers at all levels.
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The standards of care cover the routine care and management of complications occurring for women and their babies during labour, childbirth and the early postnatal period, including those of small babies during the first week of life. They define priorities for improving the
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quality of maternal and newborn care for use by planners, managers and health care providers
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This compendium collates current tools and resources on quality improvement developed by the WHO Service Delivery and Safety Department and provides examples of how the tools and resources have been applied in country settings. The target audience f
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or this document are ministries of health, facility quality improvement teams, researchers and development agencies. WHO technical programmes, regional and country offices can also use the document in their technical cooperation work with the identified audience. Those working to improve the quality of health service delivery can also make good use of this resource
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Four simple steps to practice quality improvement at health facility level
The availability of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services in health care facilities, especially in maternity and primary-care settings where they are often absent, supports core aspects of quality, equity and dignity for all people. This doc
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ument describes an approach for conducting a national situational analysis of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) as a basis for improving quality of care. This document describes the process from the initial preparatory stages, including triggers for action, through data collection and analysis to the dissemination of results. Each element of the approach is described and possible limitations and mechanisms to mitigate these are explored.
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A training package for building capacity of healthcare teams in health facilities for continous quality improvement of maternal and newborn healthcare. The focus is on the care of mothers and newborns at the time of child birth since a large proport
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ion of maternal deaths, newborn deaths and stillbirths happen around that time.
The 4-Step POCQI (Point of care Quality Improvement) package includes Coaching manual and Learner manual that present a demystified and simple model of quality improvement at the level of health facilities using local data to identify quality gaps, analyse underlying causes and improve health care practices in their own specific context without much additional resources.
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This guideline covers road-traffic-related air pollution and its links to ill health. It aims to improve air quality and so prevent a range of health conditions and deaths.