Table of Contents
EDITORIALS
- Multisectoral Policies and Programming: High-Income Countries Can and Should Be Learning From the Philippines and Other Low- and Middle-Income Countries
The global health field will miss key learning opportunities if it continues to make a false distinction between research of relevance to lowand middle-income countries and research of relevance to high-income countries.
- It’s Time to Move Beyond Traditional Health Care Worker Training Approaches
Isn't it time that the global community move beyond traditional training and supportive supervision models to improve health care worker capacity?
VIEWPOINTS
- Strategies for Improving Quality and Safety in Global Health: Lessons From Nontechnical Skills for Surgery Implementation in Rwanda
The Non-Technical Skills for Surgeons (NOTSS) framework is a taxonomy of cognitive and social skills that foster expertise and medical knowledge in the operating room. This framework can be used as a method to improve the quality of surgical care in global efforts to improve access to affordable surgery.
ORIGINAL ARTICLES
- Applying Adult Learning Best Practices to Design Immunization Training for Health Care Workers in Ghana
Best practices of adult learning were used to develop a training of trainers program for the Ghana Health Service immunization workforce. The program supported translating learning to behavior change, used class time for practice-teaching and action plan development, linked formal instruction with specific activities, and offered follow-up mentorship.
- Evaluation of the Impact of Immunization Second Year of Life Training Interventions on Health Care Workers in Ghana
Applying performance-based training interventions that follow adult learning principles and include follow-up activities after training may help to solve specific performance problems and improve health care workers’ performance in immunization service delivery. These strategies facilitate learning, minimize the forgetting curve for health care workers, and should be considered as a standard practice for future training interventions.
- Young People’s Experiences With an Empowerment-Based Behavior Change Intervention to Prevent Sexual Violence in Nairobi Informal Settlements: A Qualitative Study
This study indicates that an empowerment-based, behavioral intervention can contribute to equipping both adolescent girls and boys with concrete skills to recognize and resist sexual violence and can promote positive, nonviolent masculinities among adolescent boys.
- Income Inequalities in Hepatitis B Vaccination and Willingness to Pay Among Women of Reproductive Age in Hanoi, Vietnam
Many countries use a fee-for-service model for hepatitis B vaccination, which amplifies health disparities across socioeconomic statuses and contributes to inequalities in HBV vaccination rates. We examined the role of household income on women’s willingness to pay and the amount they are willing to pay for HBV vaccination to identify a more optimized payment scheme and equitable access across all income groups.
- Mapping the Antimicrobial Supply Chain in Bangladesh: A Scoping-Review-Based Ecological Assessment Approach
A standardized method for evaluating antimicrobial supply chains in the context of access and use could be a useful tool in assessing national capacity to implement programs that address antimicrobial resistance. We present both a novel ecological approach comprising mapping and the use of indicators that can be used to characterize national antimicrobial supply chains as well as benchmark countries and, for the first time, a country-level assessment of Bangladesh.
- Trends in National-Level Governance and Implementation of the Philippines’ Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Law from 2014 to 2020
National-level implementation of the Philippines’ Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Law has been fragmented and programmatic and centered on family planning rather than multisectoral and holistic. Establishing a common narrative can secure the buy-in of different sectors and open policy solutions to address the structural determinants of reproductive health.
- Negative Incentives for Noninstitutional Births Are Associated With a Higher Rate of Facility-Based Births in the Eastern Visaya Region, Philippines
Penalties imposed for noninstitutional deliveries by local government policies could motivate pregnant women to deliver at birthing facilities; however, local governments should address barriers to accessing a birthing facility in underserved areas before prohibiting noninstitutional deliveries.
- Readiness to Provide Antenatal Corticosteroids for Threatened Preterm Birth in Public Health Facilities in Northern India
In settings with limited resources that lack standards to ensure the quality of childbirth and newborn care, the use of antenatal corticosteroids is potentially harmful. Safe, effective use of antenatal corticosteroids requires providing standardized evidence-based practices and supportive supervision, training staff, and a facility-level actionable health information system.
- Care Around Birth Approach: A Training, Mentoring, and Quality Improvement Model to Optimize Intrapartum and Immediate Postpartum Quality of Care in India
The Care Around Birth approach provides an integrated implementation framework to improve the quality, equity, and dignity of care during the intrapartum and immediate postpartum periods, thereby addressing key drivers of maternal and newborn mortality.
- A Mixed-Methods Process Evaluation: Integrating Depression Treatment Into HIV Care in Malawi
Effectively integrating depression treatment into HIV care in low-resource settings will require substantially investing in program supervision, building and maintaining the capacity of providers, integrating into existing electronic medical records systems, and ensuring the availability of psychotherapy counselors.
- Prioritizing Health-Sector Interventions for Noncommunicable Diseases and Injuries in Low- and Lower-Middle Income Countries: National NCDI Poverty Commissions
Noncommunicable Disease and Injury (NCDI) Poverty Commissions in 16 low- and middle-income countries provided evidence-based recommendations on a local, expanded set of priority NCDIs and health-sector interventions needed in national initiatives to attain universal health coverage. These commissions provide a collective platform for policy, research, and advocacy efforts to improve coverage of cost-effective and equitable health-sector interventions for populations living in extreme poverty.
- Animal Source Food Social and Behavior Change Communication Intervention Among Girinka Livestock Transfer Beneficiaries in Rwanda: A Cluster Randomized Evaluation
A social and behavior change communication intervention designed to promote consumption of cow’s milk among families that received a cow from a government livestock transfer program increased mothers’ knowledge and awareness of milk consumption. Although intervention exposure was associated with increased frequency of children’s cow’s milk intake, it did not lead to increased consumption or dietary diversity.
- Qualitative Review of Organizational Responses to Rumors in the 2014–2016 Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak in Liberia and Sierra Leone
Rumors and misinformation were a challenge in the 2014–2016 Ebola Virus Disease response and continue to be so in the current COVID-19 pandemic. It is important to understand previous organizational approaches to identifying and addressing rumors to refine and improve these approaches.
FIELD ACTION REPORTS
- Using mHealth to Improve Timeliness and Quality of Maternal and Newborn Health in the Primary Health Care System in Ethiopia
The use of mobile health (mHealth) in Ethiopia’s primary health care system offers a potential solution to improve timeliness and quality for maternal and newborn health care services. It is user-friendly and fosters communication between health care workers and health extension workers to provide quality services across the pregnancy continuum of care.
SHORT REPORTS
- Translating Implementation Experiences and Lessons Learned From Polio Eradication Into a Global Health Course: Insights From an International Consortium
Using international collaborations to develop educational materials presents several challenges but offers enormous benefits in gleaning a wealth of information, perspectives, and context. The global course that resulted from this collaboration mirrors the goals of implementation science more broadly—to bring the findings of research into routine practice to improve health services.
- An International Virtual Classroom: The Emergency Department Experience at Weill Cornell Medicine and Weill Bugando Medical Center in Tanzania
We created a sustainable, bidirectional partnership using telecommunication technology to enhance emergency medicine education collaboration. Telemedicine is a practical and innovative methodology to expand training in emergency medicine and establish bidirectional partnerships between academic departments in high-income and low- and middle-income countries.
REVIEWS
- Implementation of GeneXpert for TB Testing in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Systematic Review
This review highlights a commonality of implementation barriers across geographically dispersed GeneXpert interventions for TB testing. This indicates the importance of using implementation frameworks to report findings that can improve public health outcomes across low- and middle-income countries.
COMMENTARIES
The demographic age structure of sub-Saharan Africa contributes significantly to the low morbidity and mortality of COVID-19 compared to other regions in the world.
Despite being standard of care, gaps in HIV-TB service delivery are present. Quality Improvement methods are effective in uncovering health systems weaknesses that impede efficient delivery of integrated HIV-TB services.
Disseminating research findings on emerging zoonotic viruses is a complex and sensitive process, particularly in contexts with histories of outbreaks. It requires an operational framework that considers the social and political context of stakeholders aiming to empower people to protect their health, while also supporting government leaders to advance global health security.
In an underprepared and under-resourced digital mental health system, the linkage of health and personal data with Aadhaar, a biometric system that provides a unique identification number to all Indian residents, poses significant privacy risks to individuals seeking mental health care. We discuss the challenges in protecting mental health data privacy due to these emerging digital health technologies.