DHS Working Papers No. 114
The main finding is that health services have been partially or completely disrupted in many countries. More than half (53%) of the countries surveyed have partially or completely disrupted ...ass="attribute-to-highlight medbox">services for hypertension treatment; 49% for treatment for diabetes and diabetes-related complications; 42% for cancer treatment, and 31% for cardiovascular emergencies.
Rehabilitation services have been disrupted in almost two-thirds (63%) of countries, even though rehabilitation is key to a healthy recovery following severe illness from COVID-19.
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The Government of Malawi’s Health Sector Strategic Plan II highlights the importance of service integration; however, in practice, this has not b...een fully realized. We conducted a mixed methods evaluation of efforts to systematically implement integrated family planning and immunization services in all health facilities and associated community sites in Ntchisi and Dowa districts during June 2016–September 2017. Methods included secondary analysis of service statistics (pre- and postintervention), focus group discussions with mothers and fathers of children under age one, and in-depth interviews with service providers, supervisors, and managers. Results indicate statistically significant increases in family planning users and shifts in use of family planning services from health facilities to community sites. The intervention had no effect on immunization doses administered or dropout rates. According to mothers and fathers, benefits of service integration included time savings, convenience, and improved understanding of services. Provision and use of integrated services were affected by availability of human resources and commodities, community linkages, data collection procedures and availability, sociocultural barriers, organization of services, and supervision and commitment of health surveillance assistants. The integration approach was perceived to be feasible and beneficial by clients and providers.
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This course aims to provide information on the basic understanding of palliative care and the elements of service program for delivering palliative... care. The course contents will also include the considerations in managing signs, symptoms and assessing the patient as well as communicating with the patient, family, and care giver, and the principles and management of respiratory, gastrointestinal, urogenital, nervous systems’ symptoms and conditions in palliative care.
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PLOS Currents Outbreaks. 2015 Aug 4 . Edition 1. doi:
10.1371/currents.outbreaks.0b0ba06009dd091bc39ddb3c6d7b0826
These guidelines provide updated evidence-based recommendations on the priority HCV-related topics from the 2018 WHO Guidelines for the care and treatment of persons diagnosed with chronic hepatitis C infection and the 2017 WHO Guidelines on hepatit...is B and C testing. These priority areas are:
direct-acting antiviral (DAA) treatment of adolescents and children ages ≥3 years of age
simplified HCV service delivery (decentralization, integration and task sharing)
HCV diagnostics – use of point-of-care (POC) HCV ribonucleic acid (RNA) assays and reflex HCV RNA testing.
These guidelines also update existing chapters without new recommendations, such as the inclusion of new manufacturers’ protocols on the use of dried blood spot (DBS) for HCV RNA testing and new data to inform the limit of detection for HCV RNA assays as a test of cure, in addition to their use for diagnosis.
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COVID-19 pandemic has become one of the biggest hindering threats to education service delivery worldwide which requires innovative solutions to ov...ercome this situation and deliver education services to children. This pandemic has put the country in an emergency state compiled with the ongoing conflicts and return of refugees from neighboring countries such as Pakistan and Iran whom are suffering from this pandemic in great numbers and its estimated that many returning Afghan refugees will be affected by this virus that requires immediate attention.
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The Ministry of Health has developed the first version of the Service Standards and Service ...n class="attribute-to-highlight medbox">Delivery Standards for the health sector in Uganda. The main objective is to provide a common understanding of what is expected by the public, service users and service providers in ensuring provision of consistently high quality service delivery. These standards also provide a roadmap for improving the quality, safety and reliability of healthcare in Uganda.
The application of these standards is expected to improve transparency and accountability in service delivery; fairness and equity in service provision; building a culture of quality management; regulation, management and control of public and private providers; and management of expectations of service recipients.
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One of the main limitations to accessing hearing aids is the lack of diagnostic and rehabilitative services, especially at primary and secondary le...vels of care. This is due to the small number of specialists in ear and hearing care, and to their poor territorial distribution which is more evident in low- and middle-income countries
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Background: COVID-19 is a global public health crisis that affects all sectors; studying the impact of this pandemic on the delivery of cardiology ...services in Africa is crucial as COVID-19-related cardiovascular complications may worsen the CVD burden in this already highly affected and resource-limited continent
Methods: This was a cross-sectional e-survey study conducted amongst cardiologists in African countries. The primary outcome was the change in service delivery in African cardiology units during the on-going COVID-19 pandemic. The secondary outcomes were the satisfaction of cardiologists with regards to the workload and factors associated with this satisfaction.
Results: There was a significant reduction in working time and the number of patients consulted by week during this pandemic (p<0.001). In general, there was a decrease in the overall activities in cardiovascular care delivery. The majority of cardiology services (76.5%) and consulting programs (85%) were adjusted to the pandemic. Only half of the participants were satisfied with their workload. Reconfiguration of the consultation schedule was associated with a reduced satisfaction of participants (p=0.02).
Conclusions: COVID-19 is associated with an overall reduction in cardiology services rendered in Africa. Since the cardiovascular burdens continue to increase in this part of the World and the risk of cardiovascular complications linked to SARS COV2 remains unchanged cardiology, departments in Africa should anticipate a significant surge of cardiology services demanded by patients after the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Consolidated guidelines on the use of antiretroviral drugs for treating and preventing HIV infection
Accessed: 26.02.2020
Compendium of Case Studies