Developing Partnerships to Promote Local Innovation

Science.gov (United States)

Waters-Bayer, Ann; van Veldhuizen, Laurens; Wettasinha, Chesha; Wongtschowski, Mariana

2004-01-01

Local innovation in agriculture and natural resource management is the process through which individuals or groups discover or develop new and better ways of managing resources, building on and expanding the boundaries of their existing knowledge. Prolinnova (Promoting Local Innovation) is a NGO-led global partnership programme that is being built…

Women NGO's and Women Empowerment in Nigeria | Arum ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

An investigation was carried out into the activities of various women non – governmental organizations (NGO) in Nigeria, as a veritable tool for women empowerment. The results of the research revealed that women NGO's have ventured into areas that were previously ignored by government such areas include female ...

On James Bond and the importance of NGO accountability

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Unerman, J.; O'Dwyer, B.

2006-01-01

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to set out key issues in the academic study of non-governmental organisation (NGO) accountability, and to introduce papers appearing in this special issue on NGO accountability. Design/methodology/approach - This is a discussion paper exploring key issues

Co-Constructing Knowledge through NGO-Driven Circle Work

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Agerbæk, Jonas

This presentation revolves around the question of what degree of control, if any, the users participating in NGO-driven development programs may have over their own development. Based on a multi-sited ethnography of NGO organizing and communication that I conducted in the period of 2010 to 2015......, and with a special analytical focus on the facilitating role of frontline NGO workers in rural East Africa, this presentation discusses enabling and constraining aspects of using circle work to co-produce knowledge in international development. More particularly I am focusing an approach to circle work called......, then participatory approaches such as REFLECT can be used not only to drive changes locally but also bolster the global participatory agenda of defining development practices and politics from the bottom and up...

CEO Emoluments Determination of Non Governmental Organisations (NGO in Melaka: A Concept Paper

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hassan Masita

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Non-governmental organisations (NGOs are formed by mutual members in conducting activities to enhance social welfare of its members and public. The issue of governance of NGO arises when such social welfare fail to be achieved. Principal-agent theory explains that agent (elected CEO or key committees is responsible to carry out NGO activities aligned with principal’s interest (which described in NGO missions and goals. If CEO or key committees are being paid to govern NGO, emolument is primarily perceived as a signal to level of governance of NGO. This study objectively to determine factors that influence the decision of emoluments paid to elected CEO or key committees. Subsequently, this study is to analyze the level of governance of NGO. NGO registered in Melaka will be selected from Registrar of Societies (ROS in Melaka. Therefore, data for this study will be collected using data from ROS Melaka. 594 registered NGO that located in Melaka will be contacted and interviewed to complete structured questionnaire. Data collected will be analyzed using SPSS software to determine the factors that influences emolument decision. Subsequently, data will be analyzed to determine the level of governance of NGOs in Malaysia, which related to emoluments decision making.

In an Age of Open Access to Research Policies: Physician and Public Health NGO Staff Research Use and Policy Awareness.

Science.gov (United States)

Moorhead, Laura L; Holzmeyer, Cheryl; Maggio, Lauren A; Steinberg, Ryan M; Willinsky, John

2015-01-01

Through funding agency and publisher policies, an increasing proportion of the health sciences literature is being made open access. Such an increase in access raises questions about the awareness and potential utilization of this literature by those working in health fields. A sample of physicians (N=336) and public health non-governmental organization (NGO) staff (N=92) were provided with relatively complete access to the research literature indexed in PubMed, as well as access to the point-of-care service UpToDate, for up to one year, with their usage monitored through the tracking of web-log data. The physicians also participated in a one-month trial of relatively complete or limited access. The study found that participants' research interests were not satisfied by article abstracts alone nor, in the case of the physicians, by a clinical summary service such as UpToDate. On average, a third of the physicians viewed research a little more frequently than once a week, while two-thirds of the public health NGO staff viewed more than three articles a week. Those articles were published since the 2008 adoption of the NIH Public Access Policy, as well as prior to 2008 and during the maximum 12-month embargo period. A portion of the articles in each period was already open access, but complete access encouraged a viewing of more research articles. Those working in health fields will utilize more research in the course of their work as a result of (a) increasing open access to research, (b) improving awareness of and preparation for this access, and (c) adjusting public and open access policies to maximize the extent of potential access, through reduction in embargo periods and access to pre-policy literature.

Innovative financing for health: what is truly innovative?

Science.gov (United States)

Atun, Rifat; Knaul, Felicia Marie; Akachi, Yoko; Frenk, Julio

2012-12-08

Development assistance for health has increased every year between 2000 and 2010, particularly for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria, to reach US$26·66 billion in 2010. The continued global economic crisis means that increased external financing from traditional donors is unlikely in the near term. Hence, new funding has to be sought from innovative financing sources to sustain the gains made in global health, to achieve the health Millennium Development Goals, and to address the emerging burden from non-communicable diseases. We use the value chain approach to conceptualise innovative financing. With this framework, we identify three integrated innovative financing mechanisms-GAVI, Global Fund, and UNITAID-that have reached a global scale. These three financing mechanisms have innovated along each step of the innovative finance value chain-namely resource mobilisation, pooling, channelling, resource allocation, and implementation-and integrated these steps to channel large amounts of funding rapidly to low-income and middle-income countries to address HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, and vaccine-preventable diseases. However, resources mobilised from international innovative financing sources are relatively modest compared with donor assistance from traditional sources. Instead, the real innovation has been establishment of new organisational forms as integrated financing mechanisms that link elements of the financing value chain to more effectively and efficiently mobilise, pool, allocate, and channel financial resources to low-income and middle-income countries and to create incentives to improve implementation and performance of national programmes. These mechanisms provide platforms for health funding in the future, especially as efforts to grow innovative financing have faltered. The lessons learnt from these mechanisms can be used to develop and expand innovative financing from international sources to address health needs in low-income and middle

NGO-promoted microcredit programs and women's empowerment in rural Bangladesh: quantitative and qualitative evidence.

Science.gov (United States)

Amin, R; Becker, S; Bayes, A

1998-01-01

Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in rural Bangladesh are reaching out to poor women with collateral-free credit programs aimed at both alleviating poverty and increasing women's status. The present study investigated the hypothesis that participation in credit-related activities by NGO credit members leads to greater empowerment of credit members compared to nonmembers. The sample was comprised of 1164 loanees and 1200 nonloanees from the five NGO areas in Bangladesh and of 1200 nonloanees from non-program areas of rural Bangladesh with no significant NGO presence. NGO credit members had significantly higher scores on all three indices of female empowerment: inter-spouse consultation, autonomy, and authority. Moreover, nonmembers within NGO program areas had higher autonomy and authority scores than nonmembers within the comparison areas. Even after background variables were controlled in the multivariate analysis, NGO credit membership and residence in an NGO program area remained significantly and positively associated with both the autonomy and authority indices. Other variables that exerted a significant positive effect on women's empowerment were concrete or corrugated buildings, area of residence outside the southern or eastern regions, nonagricultural occupation, respondent's education, and age. In focus group discussions, NGO credit loanees reported that the program made them more confident, assertive, intelligent, self-reliant, and aware of their rights. NGO credit programs that target poor women are likely to produce substantial improvements in women's social and economic status, without the long delays associated with education or employment opportunities in the formal sector.

Achieving Health SDG 3 in Africa through NGO Capacity Building ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

AJRH Managing Editor

2016-09-01

Sep 1, 2016 ... Résumé. Comme les investisseurs mondiaux d'impact se préparent à soutenir le ... Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and ... innovative financing plans. .... agencies with the support of consultants. ... Centre for Health Science Training, Research and .... place consistent project management systems.

Records and reputations : everyday politics of a Philippine Development NGO

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hilhorst, D.

2000-01-01

This study looks into the working of policies, practices and accountability of NGOs. It is based on fieldwork with one development NGO in the Cordillera of the Philippines: the Cordillera Women NGO, or CWNGO (a pseudonym). Through this study I wanted to find out why certain groups of actors

Umbrella project for Bangladesh: strengthening NGO capacity and linkages to improve reproductive health service and information. RAS/98/P55.

Science.gov (United States)

1999-06-01

In Bangladesh, the UN Population Fund is working to strengthen nongovernmental organization (NGO) capacity and linkages to improve reproductive health services and information. Specifically, the aim is to strengthen the technical and human resource capacity of participating NGOs and the functional linkages between national NGOs and relevant government agencies to help harmonize and standardize the delivery of reproductive health information and services. This umbrella project collaborates with RHI-participating NGOs in a policy paper on adolescent reproductive health, and will maintain contact with the regional dimension project to collaborate its activities. Programs implemented by partner NGOs are being reviewed and monitored, and linkages among national NGOs and government agencies are being developed. The main activities of the project are enumerated.

Health hazards and medical treatment of volunteers aged 18-30 years working in international social projects of non-governmental organizations (NGO).

Science.gov (United States)

Küpper, T; Rieke, B; Neppach, K; Morrison, A; Martin, J

2014-01-01

The specific health risk profile and diversity of treatments sought by young volunteers participating in international social projects should differ from those of their older colleagues. In the absence of any data to identify whether this was correct, a retrospective analysis was performed using a standardized questionnaire. Questions included what diseases occurred, and details of the frequency and types of treatment sought during their stay - (e.g. self-treatment, medical/dental intervention, or local healer). The 153 participants were aged 18-30 years and worked in a non-governmental organization for >6 months. The participants were: 53% female, mean age 20 years, and mean duration of stay was 11.2 months. Their NGO placement abroad was in Latin America 65.4%, 14.4% in Africa, and 9.8% in Asia. 83% of the young volunteers had received some advice regarding travel medicine before their departure. However, they suffered from more injuries compared to private travellers, and febrile infections were more common when compared to older studies. 21.2% suffered from dental problems and 50% of them sought medical treatment. This study highlights a previously unreported higher risk profile of specific health problems occurring in young NGO volunteers, including some potentially life-threatening diagnoses that differed from their older colleagues and normal travellers. It is recommended that young volunteers should receive age specific, comprehensive pre-departure training in health and safety, first aid, and management of common health problems. A medical check-up upon returning home should be mandatory. The provision of a basic first aid kit to each volunteer before departure is also recommended. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Watchdogs of the Invisible Hand: NGO Monitoring, Corporate Social Responsibility, and Industry Equilibrium

OpenAIRE

Gani Aldashev; Michela Limardi; Thierry Verdier

2013-01-01

Globalization has been accompanied by rising pressure from advocacy non-governmental organizations (NGOs) on multinational firms to act in socially-responsible manner. We analyze how NGO pressure interacts with industry structure, using a simple model of NGO-firm interaction embedded in an industry environment with endogenous markups and entry. We characterize the effect of NGO pressure on the industry equilibrium (intensity of competition, market structure, and the share of socially responsi...

Voluntary agreements and community development as CSR in innovation strategies

OpenAIRE

Ramani, S.V.; Mukherjee, V.

2011-01-01

The present paper examines how an innovating firm decides between two forms of voluntary agreements (VA) in a context, where a non-governmental organization (NGO) rather than a regulator watches over citizens' interests. The innovation generates profit and consumer surplus as well as environmental damage. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) within the innovation process is considered in terms of a redistribution of profit towards community development, with or without additional abatement e...

Bedrijven en NGO's effectief in gesprek

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Nijhof, A.H.J.; van Pijkeren, Michel; Karsmakers, Pepijn; Jonker, Jan

2005-01-01

Voor duurzaam ondernemen is afstemming met non-gouvernementele organisatis (NGO’s) vaak onontbeerlijk. Maar door de verschillende wereldbeelden van deze partijen komt die afstemming moeizaam tot stand. Het via internet gratis te gebruiken Business NGO Interactie-instrument helpt om een duidelijk

Innovation in Health Care Delivery.

Science.gov (United States)

Sharan, Alok D; Schroeder, Gregory D; West, Michael E; Vaccaro, Alexander R

2016-02-01

As reimbursement transitions from a volume-based to a value-based system, innovation in health care delivery will be needed. The process of innovation begins with framing the problem that needs to be solved along with the strategic vision that has to be achieved. Similar to scientific testing, a hypothesis is generated for a new solution to a problem. Innovation requires conducting a disciplined form of experimentation and then learning from the process. This manuscript will discuss the different types of innovation, and the key steps necessary for successful innovation in the health care field.

Observing extreme-mass-ratio inspirals with eLISA/NGO

OpenAIRE

Gair, Jonathan R; Porter, Edward K

2012-01-01

The extreme-mass-ratio inspirals (EMRIs) of stellar mass compact objects into massive black holes in the centres of galaxies are an important source of low-frequency gravitational waves for space-based detectors. We discuss the prospects for detecting these sources with the evolved Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (eLISA), recently proposed as an ESA mission candidate under the name NGO. We show that NGO could observe a few tens of EMRIs over its two year mission lifetime at redshifts z < 0...

Sustainability of NGO capacity building in southern Africa: successes and opportunities.

Science.gov (United States)

Humphries, Debbie; Gomez, Ligia; Hartwig, Kari

2011-01-01

Despite an increase in organizational capacity building efforts by external organizations in low and middle income countries, the documentation of these efforts and their effects on health programs and systems remains limited. This paper reviews key frameworks for considering sustainability of capacity building and applies these frameworks to an evaluation of the sustainability of an AIDS non-governmental organization (NGO) capacity building initiative. From 2004-2007 Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation's Secure the Future(TM) initiative in southern Africa funded a five country program, the NGO Training Institute (NGOTI), to build capacity of NGOs working to address HIV/AIDS. Lessons learned from this project include issues of ownership, the importance of integrating planning for sustainability within capacity-building projects, and the value of identifying primary capacity-building objectives in order to select sustainability strategies that are focused on maintaining program benefits. Sustainability for capacity building projects can be developed by discussing key issues early in the planning process with all primary stakeholders. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Effort of NGO in Promoting Comprehensive Sexuality Education to Improve Quality of Life among Local and Refugee Communities

Science.gov (United States)

Yeo, Kee Jiar; Lee, Shih Hui; Handayani, Lina

2018-01-01

Federation of Reproductive Health Association, Malaysia (FRHAM) is a pioneer Non-governmental Organization (NGO) in disseminating the knowledge and services of sexual reproductive health in Malaysia. A qualitative case study research design was employed to explore the roles of FRHAM in promoting Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) for the…

Disruptive innovation in health care delivery: a framework for business-model innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Hwang, Jason; Christensen, Clayton M

2008-01-01

Disruptive innovation has brought affordability and convenience to customers in a variety of industries. However, health care remains expensive and inaccessible to many because of the lack of business-model innovation. This paper explains the theory of disruptive innovation and describes how disruptive technologies must be matched with innovative business models. The authors present a framework for categorizing and developing business models in health care, followed by a discussion of some of the reasons why disruptive innovation in health care delivery has been slow.

Economic Programmes and Poverty Reduction: NGO Experiences from Tamil Nadu

OpenAIRE

D Rajasekhar; P Shobana

2000-01-01

The impact of economic programmes of SHARE, an NGO from Tamil Nadu, on poverty reduction is analysed with the help of data from 84 hosueholds. The economic programmes contributed to savings and income increase, and enhanced the leadership qualities, awareness and knowledge. The member group is not significantly different from the comparison group in terms of control over income and decision-making. This suggests that the NGO economic programmes have limitation is bringing about non-economic b...

Reverse innovation in maternal health.

Science.gov (United States)

Firoz, Tabassum; Makanga, Prestige Tatenda; Nathan, Hannah L; Payne, Beth; Magee, Laura A

2017-09-01

Reverse innovation, defined as the flow of ideas from low- to high-income settings, is gaining traction in healthcare. With an increasing focus on value, investing in low-cost but effective and innovative solutions can be of mutual benefit to both high- and low-income countries. Reverse innovation has a role in addressing maternal health challenges in high-income countries by harnessing these innovative solutions for vulnerable populations especially in rural and remote regions. In this paper, we present three examples of 'reverse innovation' for maternal health: a low-cost, easy-to-use blood pressure device (CRADLE), a diagnostic algorithm (mini PIERS) and accompanying mobile app (PIERS on the Move), and a novel method for mapping maternal outcomes (MOM).

Innovation and motivation in public health professionals.

Science.gov (United States)

García-Goñi, Manuel; Maroto, Andrés; Rubalcaba, Luis

2007-12-01

Innovations in public health services promote increases in the health status of the population. Therefore, it is a major concern for health policy makers to understand the drivers of innovation processes. This paper focuses on the differences in behaviour of managers and front-line employees in the pro-innovative provision of public health services. We utilize a survey conducted on front-line employees and managers in public health institutions across six European countries. The survey covers topics related to satisfaction, or attitude towards innovation or their institution. We undertake principal components analysis and analysis of variance, and estimate a multinomial ordered probit model to analyse the existence of different behaviour in managers and front-line employees with respect to innovation. Perception of innovation is different for managers and front-line employees in public health institutions. While front-line employees' attitude depends mostly on the overall performance of the institution, managers feel more involved and motivated, and their behaviour depends more on individual and organisational innovative profiles. It becomes crucial to make both managers and front-line employees at public health institutions feel participative and motivated in order to maximise the benefits of technical or organisational innovative process in the health services provision.

Context matters in NGO-government contracting for health service delivery: a case study from Pakistan.

Science.gov (United States)

Zaidi, Shehla; Mayhew, Susannah H; Cleland, John; Green, Andrew T

2012-10-01

Contracting non-governmental organizations (NGOs) for health service provision is gaining increasing importance in low- and middle-income countries. However, the role of the wider context in influencing the effectiveness of contracting is not well studied and is of relevance given that contracting has produced mixed results so far. This paper applies a policy analysis approach to examine the influence of policy and political factors on contracting origin, design and implementation. Evidence is drawn from a country case study of Pakistan involving extensive NGO contracting for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) prevention services supported by international donor agencies. A multilevel study was conducted using 84 in-depth interviews, 22 semi-structured interviews, document review and direct observation to examine the national policy design, provincial management of contracting and local contract implementation. There were three main findings. First, contracting origin and implementation was an inherently political process affected by the wider policy context. Although in Pakistan a combination of situational events successfully managed to introduce extensive and sophisticated contracting, it ran into difficulties during implementation due to ownership and capacity issues within government. Second, wide-scale contracting was mis-matched with the capacity of local NGOs, which resulted in sub-optimal contract implementation challenging the reliance on market simulation through contracting. Third, we found that contracting can have unintended knock-on effects on both providers and purchasers. As a result of public sector contracts, NGOs became more distanced from their grounded attributes. Effects on government purchasers were more unpredictable, with greater identification with contracting in supportive governance contexts and further distancing in unsupportive contexts. A careful approach is needed in government contracting of NGOs, taking into account acceptance of

Benefits Innovations in Employee Behavioral Health.

Science.gov (United States)

Sherman, Bruce; Block, Lori

2017-01-01

More and more employers recognize the business impact of behavioral health concerns in the workplace. This article provides insights into some of the current innovations in behavioral health benefits, along with their rationale for development. Areas of innovation include conceptual and delivery models, technological advance- ments, tools for engaging employees and ways of quantifying the business value of behavioral health benefits. The rapid growth of innovative behavioral health services should provide employers with confidence that they can tailor a program best suited to their priorities, organizational culture and cost limitations.

Global Health Innovation Technology Models

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kimberly Harding

2016-04-01

Full Text Available Chronic technology and business process disparities between High Income, Low Middle Income and Low Income (HIC, LMIC, LIC research collaborators directly prevent the growth of sustainable Global Health innova‐ tion for infectious and rare diseases. There is a need for an Open Source-Open Science Architecture Framework to bridge this divide. We are proposing such a framework for consideration by the Global Health community, by utiliz‐ ing a hybrid approach of integrating agnostic Open Source technology and healthcare interoperability standards and Total Quality Management principles. We will validate this architecture framework through our programme called Project Orchid. Project Orchid is a conceptual Clinical Intelligence Exchange and Virtual Innovation platform utilizing this approach to support clinical innovation efforts for multi-national collaboration that can be locally sustainable for LIC and LMIC research cohorts. The goal is to enable LIC and LMIC research organizations to acceler‐ ate their clinical trial process maturity in the field of drug discovery, population health innovation initiatives and public domain knowledge networks. When sponsored, this concept will be tested by 12 confirmed clinical research and public health organizations in six countries. The potential impact of this platform is reduced drug discovery and public health innovation lag time and improved clinical trial interventions, due to reliable clinical intelligence and bio-surveillance across all phases of the clinical innovation process.

Innovation spaces: six strategies to inform health care.

Science.gov (United States)

Dhar, Michael; Griffin, Margaret; Hollin, Ilene; Kachnowski, Stan

2012-01-01

Innovation remains an understudied resource within health care. Furthermore, the goals of US health care reform make innovation vitally important, while the time and resource limitations characteristic of health care make new strategies for innovation both necessary and potentially highly meaningful. The purpose of this study was to examine strategies for innovation in various industries and draw lessons for improving innovation in health care. This qualitative study began with literature research that provided a framework for discussion and identified a recurrent challenge in innovation: balancing the freedom to be creative with the need for structured management of ideas. Researchers then identified leading innovative companies and conducted phone interviews with innovation officers and other experts about their strategies for addressing the major innovation challenge. This article breaks out innovation strategies into 6 categories (dedicated times, formal teams, outside ideas, idea-sharing platforms, company/job goals, and incentives) and evaluates them for levels of control, yield, and pervasiveness. Based on this analysis, recommendations are offered for improving innovation in health care, calling for employee time allocated to innovation, dedicated innovation teams, and the incorporation of outside ideas.

Reverse innovation: an opportunity for strengthening health systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Snowdon, Anne W; Bassi, Harpreet; Scarffe, Andrew D; Smith, Alexander D

2015-02-07

Canada, when compared to other OECD countries, ranks poorly with respect to innovation and innovation adoption while struggling with increasing health system costs. As a result of its failure to innovate, the Canadian health system will struggle to meet the needs and demands of both current and future populations. The purpose of this initiative was to explore if a competition-based reverse innovation challenge could mobilize and stimulate current and future leaders to identify and lead potential reverse innovation projects that address health system challenges in Canada. An open call for applications took place over a 4-month period. Applicants were enticed to submit to the competition with a $50,000 prize for the top submission to finance their project. Leaders from a wide cross-section of sectors collectively developed evaluation criteria and graded the submissions. The criteria evaluated: proof of concept, potential value, financial impact, feasibility, and scalability as well as the use of prize money and innovation team. The competition received 12 submissions from across Canada that identified potential reverse innovations from 18 unique geographical locations that were considered developing and/or emerging markets. The various submissions addressed health system challenges relating to education, mobile health, aboriginal health, immigrant health, seniors health and women's health and wellness. Of the original 12 submissions, 5 finalists were chosen and publically profiled, and 1 was chosen to receive the top prize. The results of this initiative demonstrate that a competition that is targeted to reverse innovation does have the potential to mobilize and stimulate leaders to identify reverse innovations that have the potential for system level impact. The competition also provided important insights into the capacity of Canadian students, health care providers, entrepreneurs, and innovators to propose and implement reverse innovation in the context of the

Social innovation for the promotion of health equity.

Science.gov (United States)

Mason, Chris; Barraket, Jo; Friel, Sharon; O'Rourke, Kerryn; Stenta, Christian-Paul

2015-09-01

The role of social innovations in transforming the lives of individuals and communities has been a source of popular attention in recent years. This article systematically reviews the available evidence of the relationship between social innovation and its promotion of health equity. Guided by Fair Foundations: The VicHealth framework for health equity and examining four types of social innovation--social movements, service-related social innovations, social enterprise and digital social innovations--we find a growing literature on social innovation activities, but inconsistent evaluative evidence of their impacts on health equities, particularly at the socio-economic, political and cultural level of the framework. Distinctive characteristics of social innovations related to the promotion of health equity include the mobilization of latent or unrealised value through new combinations of (social, cultural and material) resources; growing bridging social capital and purposeful approaches to linking individual knowledge and experience to institutional change. These have implications for health promotion practice and for research about social innovation and health equity. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Open innovation in health care: analysis of an open health platform.

Science.gov (United States)

Bullinger, Angelika C; Rass, Matthias; Adamczyk, Sabrina; Moeslein, Kathrin M; Sohn, Stefan

2012-05-01

Today, integration of the public in research and development in health care is seen as essential for the advancement of innovation. This is a paradigmatic shift away from the traditional assumption that solely health care professionals are able to devise, develop, and disseminate novel concepts and solutions in health care. The present study builds on research in the field of open innovation to investigate the adoption of an open health platform by patients, care givers, physicians, family members, and the interested public. Results suggest that open innovation practices in health care lead to interesting innovation outcomes and are well accepted by participants. During the first three months, 803 participants of the open health platform submitted challenges and solutions and intensively communicated by exchanging 1454 personal messages and 366 comments. Analysis of communication content shows that empathic support and exchange of information are important elements of communication on the platform. The study presents first evidence for the suitability of open innovation practices to integrate the general public in health care research in order to foster both innovation outcomes and empathic support. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Using innovation platforms to scale out soil acidity-ameliorating ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

An innovation platform comprising of farmers, government and NGO extension and researchers organized exchange tours and end of season review meetings. The number of farmers hosting the learning centers grew from 36 to 150 due to the IP interactions. At the end of the project support in 2008, the participating farmers ...

Where are the NGOs and why? The distribution of health and development NGOs in Bolivia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Galway Lindsay P

2012-11-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background The presence and influence of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs in the landscape of global health and development have dramatically increased over the past several decades. The distribution of NGO activity and the ways in which contextual factors influence the distribution of NGO activity across geographies merit study. This paper explores the distribution of NGO activity, using Bolivia as a case study, and identifies local factors that are related to the distribution of NGO activity across municipalities in Bolivia. Methods The research question is addressed using a geographic information system (GIS and multiple regression analyses of count data. We used count data of the total number of NGO projects across Bolivian municipalities to measure NGO activity both in general and in the health sector specifically and national census data for explanatory variables of interest. Results This study provides one of the first empirical analyses exploring factors related to the distribution of NGO activity at the national scale. Our analyses show that NGO activity in Bolivia, both in general and health-sector specific, is distributed unevenly across the country. Results indicate that NGO activity is related to population size, extent of urbanization, size of the indigenous population, and health system coverage. Results for NGO activity in general and health-sector specific NGO activity were similar. Conclusions The uneven distribution of NGO activity may suggest a lack of co-ordination among NGOs working in Bolivia as well as a lack of co-ordination among NGO funders. Co-ordination of NGO activity is most needed in regions characterized by high NGO activity in order to avoid duplication of services and programmes and inefficient use of limited resources. Our findings also indicate that neither general nor health specific NGO activity is related to population need, when defined as population health status or education level or poverty

Where are the NGOs and why? The distribution of health and development NGOs in Bolivia.

Science.gov (United States)

Galway, Lindsay P; Corbett, Kitty K; Zeng, Leilei

2012-11-23

The presence and influence of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the landscape of global health and development have dramatically increased over the past several decades. The distribution of NGO activity and the ways in which contextual factors influence the distribution of NGO activity across geographies merit study. This paper explores the distribution of NGO activity, using Bolivia as a case study, and identifies local factors that are related to the distribution of NGO activity across municipalities in Bolivia. The research question is addressed using a geographic information system (GIS) and multiple regression analyses of count data. We used count data of the total number of NGO projects across Bolivian municipalities to measure NGO activity both in general and in the health sector specifically and national census data for explanatory variables of interest. This study provides one of the first empirical analyses exploring factors related to the distribution of NGO activity at the national scale. Our analyses show that NGO activity in Bolivia, both in general and health-sector specific, is distributed unevenly across the country. Results indicate that NGO activity is related to population size, extent of urbanization, size of the indigenous population, and health system coverage. Results for NGO activity in general and health-sector specific NGO activity were similar. The uneven distribution of NGO activity may suggest a lack of co-ordination among NGOs working in Bolivia as well as a lack of co-ordination among NGO funders. Co-ordination of NGO activity is most needed in regions characterized by high NGO activity in order to avoid duplication of services and programmes and inefficient use of limited resources. Our findings also indicate that neither general nor health specific NGO activity is related to population need, when defined as population health status or education level or poverty levels. Considering these results we discuss broader implications

Stimulating innovative research in health promotion.

Science.gov (United States)

Larouche, Annie; Potvin, Louise

2013-06-01

The Global Working Group on Health Promotion Research (GWG HPR) of the International Union for Health Promotion and Education (IUHPE) presents a collection of four articles illustrating innovative avenues for health promotion research. This commentary synthesizes the contributions of these articles while attempting to define the contours of research in health promotion. We propose that innovation in research involves the adoption of a reflexive approach wherein consideration of context plays different roles. The reflexive process consists of questioning what is taken for granted in the conceptualization and operationalization of research. It involves linking research findings and its theoretical foundations to characteristics and goals of the field and observed realities, while orienting reflection on specific objects. The reflexive nature of the research activity is of paramount importance for innovation in health promotion. With the publication of this series, the GWG HPR wishes to strengthen health promotion research capacity at the global level and reaffirm health promotion as a specific research domain.

Supplier challenges in health tech innovation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rolfstam, Max

Suppliers, in particular small innovative firms, is an important contributor not only for innovation in health-tech, but also a component to consider in the light of the emerging policy interest for using public procurement as a means to stimulate innovation. Research on barriers preventing...

Hacking Health: Bottom-up Innovation for Healthcare

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jeeshan Chowdhury

2012-07-01

Full Text Available Healthcare is not sustainable and still functions with outdated technology (e.g., pagers, paper records. Top-down approaches by governments and corporations have failed to deliver digital technologies to modernize healthcare. Disruptive innovation must come from the ground up by bridging the gap between front-line health experts and innovators in the latest web and mobile technology. Hacking Health is a hackathon that is focused on social innovation more than technical innovation. Our approach to improve healthcare is to pair technological innovators with healthcare experts to build realistic, human-centric solutions to front-line healthcare problems.

Business-NGO interactions in a multi-stakeholder context

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Huijstee, M.M. van; Glasbergen, P.

2010-01-01

The main purpose of this paper is to contribute to our understanding of the conditions under which Business– nongovernmental organization (NGO) interactions lead to improvements in corporate social responsibility (CSR), by assessing the role that the stakeholder context of the firm plays in the

Collaborative innovation developing health support ecosystems

CERN Document Server

Kodama, Mitsuru

2015-01-01

With the development of the aging society and the increased importance of emergency risk management in recent years, a large number of medical care challenges - advancing medical treatments, care & support, pharmacological treatments, greater health awareness, emergency treatments, telemedical treatment and care, the introduction of electronic charts, and rising costs - are emerging as social issues throughout the whole world. Hospitals and other medical institutions must develop and maintain superior management to achieve systems that can provide better medical care, welfare and health while enabling "support innovation." Key medical care, welfare and health industries play a crucial role in this, but also of importance are management innovation models that enable "collaborative innovation" by closely linking diverse fields such as ICT, energy, electric equipment, machinery and transport. Looking across different industries, Collaborative Innovation offers new knowledge and insights on the extraord...

Innovating in Health Care – Modern Challenges

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sebija Izetbegović

2013-12-01

Full Text Available Introduction: The goal of this article is to present that innovating in health care begins to become an imperative in present time. Innovating will enable the achievement of the highest quality health care results and the patients' satisfaction with the least amount of financial resources.Methods: The thorough literature review of multifaceted sources was conducted including: studies, books, monographies and peer – reviewed journals with the goal of achieving the clearer picture of today's modern challenges in the complex fi eld of health care innovation.Discussion: Theoretical and empirical studies clearly indicate that the innovation is one of the key factors in the competitiveness of the organization and its survival in the market. Developed countries of the world today are making significant efforts in order for innovation to become a national priority, with special emphasis placed on measuring innovation performance. Results of theoretical and practical studies show that in the future, treatment of the most diffi cult and complex diseases of our time, through the entirely new discoveries and results, derived from the process of innovation, will project entirely new positive forms and outcomes in the health care.Conclusion: There is no doubt that the humanity and medical science will through innovation succeed to win the battles against the majority of the most complex contemporary diseases. Malignant neoplasm of tomorrow, through the application of a new, innovative approaches to research, processes and treatments will become a chronic diseases. Among many, the particular problem in the process of innovation will represent the cost of research and development (R&D, production and the safety of prescription drugs.

A model for 'reverse innovation' in health care.

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Depasse, Jacqueline W; Lee, Patrick T

2013-08-30

'Reverse innovation,' a principle well established in the business world, describes the flow of ideas from emerging to more developed economies. There is strong and growing interest in applying this concept to health care, yet there is currently no framework for describing the stages of reverse innovation or identifying opportunities to accelerate the development process. This paper combines the business concept of reverse innovation with diffusion of innovation theory to propose a model for reverse innovation as a way to innovate in health care. Our model includes the following steps: (1) identifying a problem common to lower- and higher-income countries; (2) innovation and spread in the low-income country (LIC); (3) crossover to the higher-income country (HIC); and (4) innovation and spread in the HIC. The crucial populations in this pathway, drawing from diffusion of innovation theory, are LIC innovators, LIC early adopters, and HIC innovators. We illustrate the model with three examples of current reverse innovations. We then propose four sets of specific actions that forward-looking policymakers, entrepreneurs, health system leaders, and researchers may take to accelerate the movement of promising solutions through the reverse innovation pipeline: (1) identify high-priority problems shared by HICs and LICs; (2) create slack for change, especially for LIC innovators, LIC early adopters, and HIC innovators; (3) create spannable social distances between LIC early adopters and HIC innovators; and (4) measure reverse innovation activity globally.

A Blueprint for Innovation to Achieve Health System Transformation.

Science.gov (United States)

Snowdon, Anne W

2017-01-01

Global health systems are challenged by escalating costs and growing demands for care created by the demands of aging populations and rising rates of chronic illness which place unsustainable pressure on health systems to meet population health needs. To overcome these challenges, transformational change is needed to strengthen health system performance and sustainability. Innovation is widely viewed as the strategy to drive transformational change in health systems; yet to date, innovation has lacked a clearly defined focus or agenda to achieve transformation. An actionable innovation agenda is needed to achieve transformational change for health systems. The key conditions for success as an innovation strategy are examined, including clearly defined innovation objectives, key milestones, and actionable steps every system stakeholder must pursue in order to guide the innovation agenda and ultimately accelerate the transformational changes needed for a sustainable healthcare system that delivers value to populations.

Mentoring, training and support to global health innovators: a scoping review.

Science.gov (United States)

Cho, Dan-Bi; Cole, Donald; Simiyu, Ken; Luong, Winnie; Neufeld, Vic

2013-06-28

Global health innovators must navigate substantial complexities to successfully develop, implement and sustain global health innovations with impact through application of an Integrated InnovationTM approach. We sought to examine the nature of the literature and evidence around mentoring, training and support of global health innovators. We conducted a scoping review searching eight databases with terms capturing different kinds of innovation and support. Assessment of relevance and mapping was completed by two reviewers, with interpretation by the review team. Twenty-eight relevant papers provided perspectives on fostering global health innovators and innovation. Fifteen included empirical data on supports to global health innovators involving a wide range of innovators. Eight included documentation of outcomes but without designs to determine effectiveness. The diverse mentoring, training and support activities included: business incubators, support organizations and centres for entrepreneurship, technology transfer and intellectual property management, internship programs for business skill development, initiatives to bridge industry and researchers, and platforms for South-led innovation for global health. We propose the cultivation of a pipeline of global health innovators to increase the number of appropriate, sustainable innovations with impact in global health. Further empirical work on how to effectively support global health innovators is needed.

Science-based health innovation in sub-Saharan Africa

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Daar Abdallah S

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Abstract In recent years emerging markets such as India, China, and Brazil have developed appropriate business models and lower-cost technological innovations to address health challenges locally and internationally. But it is not well understood what capabilities African countries, with their high disease burden, have in science-based health innovation. This gap in knowledge is addressed by this series in BMC International Health and Human Rights. The series presents the results of extensive on-the-ground research in the form of four country case studies of health and biotechnology innovation, six studies of institutions within Africa involved in health product development, and one study of health venture funds in Africa. To the best of our knowledge it is the first extensive collection of empirical work on African science-based health innovation. The four country cases are Ghana, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. The six case studies of institutions are A to Z Textiles (Tanzania, Acorn Technologies (South Africa, Bioventures venture capital fund (South Africa, the Malagasy Institute of Applied Research (IMRA; Madagascar, the Kenyan Medical Research Institute (KEMRI; Kenya, and Niprisan’s development by Nigeria’s National Institute for Pharmaceutical Research and Development and Xechem (Nigeria. All of the examples highlight pioneering attempts to build technological capacity, create economic opportunities, and retain talent on a continent significantly affected by brain drain. They point to the practical challenges for innovators on the ground, and suggest potentially helpful policies, funding streams, and other support systems. For African nations, health innovation represents an opportunity to increase domestic capacity to solve health challenges; for international funders, it is an opportunity to move beyond foreign aid and dependency. The shared goal is creating self-sustaining innovation that has both health and development impacts. While

Science-based health innovation in sub-Saharan Africa.

Science.gov (United States)

Al-Bader, Sara; Masum, Hassan; Simiyu, Ken; Daar, Abdallah S; Singer, Peter A

2010-12-13

In recent years emerging markets such as India, China, and Brazil have developed appropriate business models and lower-cost technological innovations to address health challenges locally and internationally. But it is not well understood what capabilities African countries, with their high disease burden, have in science-based health innovation.This gap in knowledge is addressed by this series in BMC International Health and Human Rights. The series presents the results of extensive on-the-ground research in the form of four country case studies of health and biotechnology innovation, six studies of institutions within Africa involved in health product development, and one study of health venture funds in Africa. To the best of our knowledge it is the first extensive collection of empirical work on African science-based health innovation.The four country cases are Ghana, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. The six case studies of institutions are A to Z Textiles (Tanzania), Acorn Technologies (South Africa), Bioventures venture capital fund (South Africa), the Malagasy Institute of Applied Research (IMRA; Madagascar), the Kenyan Medical Research Institute (KEMRI; Kenya), and Niprisan's development by Nigeria's National Institute for Pharmaceutical Research and Development and Xechem (Nigeria).All of the examples highlight pioneering attempts to build technological capacity, create economic opportunities, and retain talent on a continent significantly affected by brain drain. They point to the practical challenges for innovators on the ground, and suggest potentially helpful policies, funding streams, and other support systems.For African nations, health innovation represents an opportunity to increase domestic capacity to solve health challenges; for international funders, it is an opportunity to move beyond foreign aid and dependency. The shared goal is creating self-sustaining innovation that has both health and development impacts. While this is a long-term strategy

The link between health governance models and global health innovation: an exploration of OECD nations.

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Schnarr, Karin; Snowdon, Anne; Cramm, Heidi; Cohen, Jason; Alessi, Charles

2015-01-01

While there is established research that explores individual innovations across countries or developments in a specific health area, there is less work that attempts to match national innovations to specific systems of health governance to uncover themes across nations. We used a cross-comparison design that employed content analysis of health governance models and innovation patterns in eight OECD nations (Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United States). Country-level model of health governance may impact the focus of health innovation within the eight jurisdictions studied. Innovation across all governance models has targeted consumer engagement in health systems, the integration of health services across the continuum of care, access to care in the community, and financial models that drive competition. Improving our understanding of the linkage between health governance and innovation in health systems may heighten awareness of potential enablers and barriers to innovation success.

Health System Transformation through a Scalable, Actionable Innovation Strategy.

Science.gov (United States)

Snowdon, Anne

2017-01-01

The authors who contributed to this issue of Healthcare Papers have provided rich insights into a promising innovation agenda to support transformational change aimed at achieving high-performing, person-centric health systems that are sustainable and deliver value. First and foremost, the commentaries make clear that a focused innovation agenda with defined goals, objectives and milestones is needed, if innovation is to be a viable and successful strategy to achieve health system transformation. To date, innovation has been a catch-all term for solving the many challenges health systems are experiencing. Yet, innovation on its own cannot fix all the ills of a health system; strategic goals and objectives are needed to define the way forward if innovation is to achieve value for Canadians. To this end, the authors identify goals and objectives that are worthy of serious consideration by all health system stakeholders.

Federal Program Encourages Health Service Innovations on Developmental Disabilities

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Nix, Mary P.

2009-01-01

There is always room for improvement in the delivery of health services. This article discusses the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's (AHRQ) Health Care Innovations Exchange (www.innovations.ahrq.gov), a comprehensive program that aims to increase awareness of innovative strategies to meet health service delivery challenges and…

The NGO/Military Relationship and Complex Contingencies: A Tool Review

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Wright, Stephanie

2000-01-01

.... This is a review of factors driving that involvement and, as a result, the tools that are developing for interagency coordination in cases of complex contingencies with a focus primarily on the NGO...

Innovations in plant health services in Nicaragua

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danielsen, Solveig; Centeno, Julio; López, Julio

2013-01-01

to the creation of a ‘National Plant Health System’ offering regular advice to farmers. The innovations were driven by a momentum for change, committed individuals, joint learning and flexibility in programme management. External facilitation encouraged experimentation and bolstered growth of new alliances....... The development of the national plant health system was constrained by existing work cultures that limit the scope of individual and institutional innovations.......Establishing a few community-based plant clinics in Nicaragua led to a series of innovations in plant health service delivery. A grassroots experiment became a nationwide initiative involving local service providers, universities, research institutions and diagnostic laboratories. This led...

Innovation in patient-centered care: lessons from a qualitative study of innovative health care organizations in Washington State

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Reed Peter

2012-12-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Growing interest in the promise of patient-centered care has led to numerous health care innovations, including the patient-centered medical home, shared decision-making, and payment reforms. How best to vet and adopt innovations is an open question. Washington State has been a leader in health care reform and is a rich laboratory for patient-centered innovations. We sought to understand the process of patient-centered care innovation undertaken by innovative health care organizations – from strategic planning to goal selection to implementation to maintenance. Methods We conducted key-informant interviews with executives at five health plans, five provider organizations, and ten primary care clinics in Washington State. At least two readers of each interview transcript identified themes inductively; final themes were determined by consensus. Results Innovation in patient-centered care was a strategic objective chosen by nearly every organization in this study. However, other goals were paramount: cost containment, quality improvement, and organization survival. Organizations commonly perceived effective chronic disease management and integrated health information technology as key elements for successful patient-centered care innovation. Inertia, resource deficits, fee-for-service payment, and regulatory limits on scope of practice were cited as barriers to innovation, while organization leadership, human capital, and adaptive culture facilitated innovation. Conclusions Patient-centered care innovations reflected organizational perspectives: health plans emphasized cost-effectiveness while providers emphasized health care delivery processes. Health plans and providers shared many objectives, yet the two rarely collaborated to achieve them. The process of innovation is heavily dependent on organizational culture and leadership. Policymakers can improve the pace and quality of patient-centered innovation by setting targets

Challenges to Value-Enhancing Innovation in Health Care Delivery: Commonalities and Contrasts with Innovation in Drugs and Devices.

Science.gov (United States)

Garber, Steven; Gates, Susan M; Blume-Kohout, Margaret E; Burgdorf, James R; Wu, Helen

2012-01-01

Limiting the growth of health care costs while improving population health is perhaps the most important and difficult challenge facing U.S. health policymakers. The role of innovation in advancing these social goals is controversial, with many seeing innovation as a major cause of cost growth and many others viewing innovation as crucial for improving the quality of care and health outcomes. The authors argue that mitigating the tension between improving health and controlling costs requires more-nuanced perspectives on innovation. More specifically, they argue that policymakers should carefully distinguish between innovative activities that are worth their social costs and activities that are not worth their social costs and try to encourage the former and discourage the latter. The article considers innovation in drugs, devices, and methods of delivering health care, with particular attention to delivery.

The impact of biomedical innovation on longevity and health

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Frank R Lichtenberg

2015-03-01

Full Text Available Many authors have expressed the view that a substantial portion of recent gains in longevity and health is due to biomedical research and innovation. This article describes the methodologies and findings of a number of studies based on observational data that have sought to measure the impact of biomedical innovation on the longevity and health of Americans and other populations during recent decades. Most of these studies have examined the impact of innovation in pharmaceuticals, the most research-intensive medical good or service. Two measures of medical innovation that have been used are the mean vintage of the medical goods or procedures used by an individual or population, and the number of distinct products (e.g. drugs available for treating a condition. Longevity (e.g. time till death is the health outcome that has been analyzed the most, but several studies have studied the impact of medical (i.e. pharmaceutical innovation on the ability of people to work or engage in activities of daily living. Some studies have been based on cross-sectional patient-level data. Others have been based on longitudinal, region-level data; they have investigated whether regions (e.g. states undergoing more rapid medical innovation have exhibited larger improvements in health. And some studies have been based on longitudinal, disease-level data; they have investigated whether the medical conditions undergoing more rapid innovation have exhibited larger gains in health outcomes. Innovation related to some specific major diseases (e.g. cardiovascular disease and cancer has been investigated, but the overall impact of innovation related to other major diseases (e.g. diabetes has not.These studies provide considerable support for the hypothesis that a substantial portion of recent gains in longevity and health is due to biomedical research and innovation. It would be desirable to apply these methods to data from developing countries.

Shaping innovation in health care: A content analysis of innovation policies in the English NHS, 1948-2015.

Science.gov (United States)

Farchi, Tomas; Salge, Torsten-Oliver

2017-11-01

Governments around the world seek to design policies that enhance the innovative capacity of public service. Hence, identifying the underlying meanings attributed to innovation concepts in public policies is critical, as these very understandings inform not only the policy discourses, but also the overall institutional landscape regulating innovation activities. This paper examines such fundamental definitional aspects in the specific context of the National Health Service in England. For this purpose, it traces the evolution of the innovation concept in policy discourse based on the analysis of 21 key policy documents published or commissioned by the English Department of Health between 1948 and 2015. Systematic analysis of these texts reveals that policymakers' conception of healthcare innovation broadened considerably over time. English health innovation policy initially focused on basic biomedical research. Subsequently, it entered a transitional period, zeroing in on science- and technology-based innovation. Finally, this focus gradually shifted to a broader conception of innovation translating into health, economic, and service design benefits. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

CMS Innovation Center Health Care Innovation Awards

Science.gov (United States)

Berry, Sandra H.; Concannon, Thomas W.; Morganti, Kristy Gonzalez; Auerbach, David I.; Beckett, Megan K.; Chen, Peggy G.; Farley, Donna O.; Han, Bing; Harris, Katherine M.; Jones, Spencer S.; Liu, Hangsheng; Lovejoy, Susan L.; Marsh, Terry; Martsolf, Grant R.; Nelson, Christopher; Okeke, Edward N.; Pearson, Marjorie L.; Pillemer, Francesca; Sorbero, Melony E.; Towe, Vivian; Weinick, Robin M.

2013-01-01

Abstract The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation within the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has funded 108 Health Care Innovation Awards, funded through the Affordable Care Act, for applicants who proposed compelling new models of service delivery or payment improvements that promise to deliver better health, better health care, and lower costs through improved quality of care for Medicare, Medicaid, and Children's Health Insurance Program enrollees. CMS is also interested in learning how new models would affect subpopulations of beneficiaries (e.g., those eligible for Medicare and Medicaid and complex patients) who have unique characteristics or health care needs that could be related to poor outcomes. In addition, the initiative seeks to identify new models of workforce development and deployment, as well as models that can be rapidly deployed and have the promise of sustainability. This article describes a strategy for evaluating the results. The goal for the evaluation design process is to create standardized approaches for answering key questions that can be customized to similar groups of awardees and that allow for rapid and comparable assessment across awardees. The evaluation plan envisions that data collection and analysis will be carried out on three levels: at the level of the individual awardee, at the level of the awardee grouping, and as a summary evaluation that includes all awardees. Key dimensions for the evaluation framework include implementation effectiveness, program effectiveness, workforce issues, impact on priority populations, and context. The ultimate goal is to identify strategies that can be employed widely to lower cost while improving care. PMID:28083297

A digital health innovation ecosystem for South Africa

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Herselman, Marlien

2016-05-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of how a digital health innovation ecosystem was conceptualised and validated for South Africa. Largely, we focus on defining strategies to build Digital Health Innovation Ecosystems in the context...

Healthcare technology innovation adoption electronic health records and other emerging health information technology innovations

CERN Document Server

Daim, Tugrul U; Basoglu, Nuri; Kök, Orhun M; Hogaboam, Liliya

2016-01-01

This book aims to study the factors affecting the adoption and diffusion of Health Information Technology (HIT) innovation. It analyzes the adoption processes of various tools and applications, particularly Electronic Health Records (EHR), highlighting the impact on various sectors of the healthcare system, such as physicians, administration,  and patient care, while also identifying the various pitfalls and gaps in the literature. With the various challenges currently facing the United States healthcare system, the study, adoption and diffusion of healthcare technology innovation, particularly HIT, is imperative to achieving national goals. This book is organized into three sections. Section one reviews theories and applications for the diffusion of Health Care Technologies. Section two evaluates EHR technology, including the barriers and enables in adoption and alternative technologies. Finally, section three examines the factors impacting the adoption of EHR systems. This book will be a key source for stu...

The risks of innovation in health care.

Science.gov (United States)

Enzmann, Dieter R

2015-04-01

Innovation in health care creates risks that are unevenly distributed. An evolutionary analogy using species to represent business models helps categorize innovation experiments and their risks. This classification reveals two qualitative categories: early and late diversification experiments. Early diversification has prolific innovations with high risk because they encounter a "decimation" stage, during which most experiments disappear. Participants face high risk. The few decimation survivors can be sustaining or disruptive according to Christensen's criteria. Survivors enter late diversification, during which they again expand, but within a design range limited to variations of the previous surviving designs. Late diversifications carry lower risk. The exception is when disruptive survivors "diversify," which amplifies their disruption. Health care and radiology will experience both early and late diversifications, often simultaneously. Although oversimplifying Christensen's concepts, early diversifications are likely to deliver disruptive innovation, whereas late diversifications tend to produce sustaining innovations. Current health care consolidation is a manifestation of late diversification. Early diversifications will appear outside traditional care models and physical health care sites, as well as with new science such as molecular diagnostics. They warrant attention because decimation survivors will present both disruptive and sustaining opportunities to radiology. Radiology must participate in late diversification by incorporating sustaining innovations to its value chain. Given the likelihood of disruptive survivors, radiology should seriously consider disrupting itself rather than waiting for others to do so. Disruption entails significant modifications of its value chain, hence, its business model, for which lessons may become available from the pharmaceutical industry's current simultaneous experience with early and late diversifications. Copyright

How to calculate the annual costs of NGO-implemented programmes to support orphans and vulnerable children: a six-step approach.

Science.gov (United States)

Larson, Bruce A; Wambua, Nancy

2011-12-19

Information on the costs of implementing programmes designed to provide support of orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) in sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere is increasingly being requested by donors for programme evaluation purposes. To date, little information exists to document the costs and structure of costs of OVC programmes as actually implemented "on the ground" by local non-governmental organizations (NGOs). This analysis provides a practical, six-step approach that NGOs can incorporate into routine operations to evaluate their costs of implementing their OVC programmes annually. This approach is applied to the Community-Based Care for Orphans and Vulnerable Children (CBCO) Program implemented by BIDII (a Kenyan NGO) in Eastern Province of Kenya. The costing methodology involves the following six steps: accessing and organizing the NGO's annual financial report into logical sub-categories; reorganizing the sub-categories into input cost categories to create a financial cost profile; estimating the annual equivalent payment for programme equipment; documenting donations to the NGO for programme implementation; including a portion of NGO organizational costs not attributed to specific programmes; and including the results of Steps 3-5 into an expanded cost profile. Detailed results are provided for the CBCO programme. This paper shows through a concrete example how NGOs implementing OVC programmes (and other public health programmes) can organize themselves for data collection and documentation prospectively during the implementation of their OVC programmes so that costing analyses become routine practice to inform programme implementation rather than a painful and flawed retrospective activity. Such information is required if the costs and outcomes achieved by OVC programmes will ever be clearly documented and compared across OVC programmes and other types of programmes (prevention, treatment, etc.).

Building a Culture of Health Informatics Innovation and Entrepreneurship: A New Frontier.

Science.gov (United States)

Househ, Mowafa; Alshammari, Riyad; Almutairi, Mariam; Jamal, Amr; Alshoaib, Saleh

2015-01-01

Entrepreneurship and innovation within the health informatics (HI) scientific community are relatively sluggish when compared to other disciplines such as computer science and engineering. Healthcare in general, and specifically, the health informatics scientific community needs to embrace more innovative and entrepreneurial practices. In this paper, we explore the concepts of innovation and entrepreneurship as they apply to the health informatics scientific community. We also outline several strategies to improve the culture of innovation and entrepreneurship within the health informatics scientific community such as: (I) incorporating innovation and entrepreneurship in health informatics education; (II) creating strong linkages with industry and healthcare organizations; (III) supporting national health innovation and entrepreneurship competitions; (IV) creating a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship within healthcare organizations; (V) developing health informatics policies that support innovation and entrepreneurship based on internationally recognized standards; and (VI) develop an health informatics entrepreneurship ecosystem. With these changes, we conclude that embracing health innovation and entrepreneurship may be more readily accepted over the long-term within the health informatics scientific community.

Imagining value, imagining users: academic technology transfer for health innovation.

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Miller, Fiona Alice; Sanders, Carrie B; Lehoux, Pascale

2009-04-01

Governments have invested heavily in the clinical and economic promise of health innovation and express increasing concern with the efficacy and efficiency of the health innovation system. In considering strategies for 'better' health innovation, policy makers and researchers have taken a particular interest in the work of universities and related public research organizations: How do these organizations identify and transfer promising innovations to market, and do these efforts make best use of public sector investments? We conducted an ethnographic study of technology transfer offices (TTOs) in Ontario and British Columbia, Canada, to consider the place of health and health system imperatives in judgments of value in early-stage health innovation. Our analysis suggests that the valuation process is poorly specified as a set of task-specific judgments. Instead, we argue that technology transfer professionals are active participants in the construction of the innovation and assign value by 'imagining' the end product in its 'context of use'. Oriented as they are to the commercialization of health technology, TTOs understand users primarily as market players. The immediate users of TTOs' efforts are commercial partners (i.e., licensees, investors) who are capable of translating current discoveries into future commodities. The ultimate end users - patients, clinicians, health systems - are the future consumers of the products to be sold. Attention to these proximate and more distal users in the valuation process is a complex and constitutive feature of the work of health technology transfer. At the same time, judgements about individual technologies are made in relation to a broader imperative through which TTOs seek to imagine and construct sustainable innovation systems. Judgments of value are rendered sensible in relation to the logic of valuation for systems of innovation that, in turn, configure users of health innovation in systemic ways.

The promise and challenge of collaboration for CSR: Corporate- NGO engagement

NARCIS (Netherlands)

V. Chaudri (Vidhi)

2015-01-01

markdownabstractAgainst the backdrop of a new Indian legislation that makes CSR mandatory, this short piece unpacks the pragmatic and ideological tensions and challenges in achieving the promise of corporate-NGO engagement.

The Public Health Innovation Model: Merging Private Sector Processes with Public Health Strengths.

Science.gov (United States)

Lister, Cameron; Payne, Hannah; Hanson, Carl L; Barnes, Michael D; Davis, Siena F; Manwaring, Todd

2017-01-01

Public health enjoyed a number of successes over the twentieth century. However, public health agencies have arguably been ill equipped to sustain these successes and address the complex threats we face today, including morbidity and mortality associated with persistent chronic diseases and emerging infectious diseases, in the context of flat funding and new and changing health care legislation. Transformational leaders, who are not afraid of taking risks to develop innovative approaches to combat present-day threats, are needed within public health agencies. We propose the Public Health Innovation Model (PHIM) as a tool for public health leaders who wish to integrate innovation into public health practice. This model merges traditional public health program planning models with innovation principles adapted from the private sector, including design thinking, seeking funding from private sector entities, and more strongly emphasizing program outcomes. We also discuss principles that leaders should consider adopting when transitioning to the PHIM, including cross-collaboration, community buy-in, human-centered assessment, autonomy and creativity, rapid experimentation and prototyping, and accountability to outcomes.

The Public Health Innovation Model: Merging Private Sector Processes with Public Health Strengths

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cameron Lister

2017-08-01

Full Text Available Public health enjoyed a number of successes over the twentieth century. However, public health agencies have arguably been ill equipped to sustain these successes and address the complex threats we face today, including morbidity and mortality associated with persistent chronic diseases and emerging infectious diseases, in the context of flat funding and new and changing health care legislation. Transformational leaders, who are not afraid of taking risks to develop innovative approaches to combat present-day threats, are needed within public health agencies. We propose the Public Health Innovation Model (PHIM as a tool for public health leaders who wish to integrate innovation into public health practice. This model merges traditional public health program planning models with innovation principles adapted from the private sector, including design thinking, seeking funding from private sector entities, and more strongly emphasizing program outcomes. We also discuss principles that leaders should consider adopting when transitioning to the PHIM, including cross-collaboration, community buy-in, human-centered assessment, autonomy and creativity, rapid experimentation and prototyping, and accountability to outcomes.

A theoretical framework to support research of health service innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Fox, Amanda; Gardner, Glenn; Osborne, Sonya

2015-02-01

Health service managers and policy makers are increasingly concerned about the sustainability of innovations implemented in health care settings. The increasing demand on health services requires that innovations are both effective and sustainable; however, research in this field is limited, with multiple disciplines, approaches and paradigms influencing the field. These variations prevent a cohesive approach, and therefore the accumulation of research findings, in the development of a body of knowledge. The purpose of this paper is to provide a thorough examination of the research findings and provide an appropriate theoretical framework to examine sustainability of health service innovation. This paper presents an integrative review of the literature available in relation to sustainability of health service innovation and provides the development of a theoretical framework based on integration and synthesis of the literature. A theoretical framework serves to guide research, determine variables, influence data analysis and is central to the quest for ongoing knowledge development. This research outlines the sustainability of innovation framework; a theoretical framework suitable for examining the sustainability of health service innovation. If left unaddressed, health services research will continue in an ad hoc manner, preventing full utilisation of outcomes, recommendations and knowledge for effective provision of health services. The sustainability of innovation theoretical framework provides an operational basis upon which reliable future research can be conducted.

New indicators of innovation in the health sector

OpenAIRE

Sivertsen, Gunnar; Kværner, Kari J.

2016-01-01

This paper reports on a new model for the measurement and stimulation of service innovation and commercialization in the health sector which has been developed for the Norwegian Ministry of Health and will be piloted in 2016. Data for the indicators are recorded from a new shared national innovation management and information system in which the primary function (independent of measurement) is to aid the phase-to-phase efficiency and valuation work in daily innovation processes, and to create...

Ngo accountability and sustainability issues in the changing global environment

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Unerman, J.; O'Dwyer, B.

2010-01-01

This article, based on a plenary lecture given at the First International Conference on Sustainable Management of Public and Not for Profit Organizations held at the University of Bologna, Forli Campus, Italy in July 2009, provides an overview of issues in non-governmental organization (NGO)

Innovative approaches for improving maternal and newborn health--A landscape analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Lunze, Karsten; Higgins-Steele, Ariel; Simen-Kapeu, Aline; Vesel, Linda; Kim, Julia; Dickson, Kim

2015-12-17

Essential interventions can improve maternal and newborn health (MNH) outcomes in low- and middle-income countries, but their implementation has been challenging. Innovative MNH approaches have the potential to accelerate progress and to lead to better health outcomes for women and newborns, but their added value to health systems remains incompletely understood. This study's aim was to analyze the landscape of innovative MNH approaches and related published evidence. Systematic literature review and descriptive analysis based on the MNH continuum of care framework and the World Health Organization health system building blocks, analyzing the range and nature of currently published MNH approaches that are considered innovative. We used 11 databases (MedLine, Web of Science, CINAHL, Cochrane, Popline, BLDS, ELDIS, 3ie, CAB direct, WHO Global Health Library and WHOLIS) as data source and extracted data according to our study protocol. Most innovative approaches in MNH are iterations of existing interventions, modified for contexts in which they had not been applied previously. Many aim at the direct organization and delivery of maternal and newborn health services or are primarily health workforce interventions. Innovative approaches also include health technologies, interventions based on community ownership and participation, and novel models of financing and policy making. Rigorous randomized trials to assess innovative MNH approaches are rare; most evaluations are smaller pilot studies. Few studies assessed intervention effects on health outcomes or focused on equity in health care delivery. Future implementation and evaluation efforts need to assess innovations' effects on health outcomes and provide evidence on potential for scale-up, considering cost, feasibility, appropriateness, and acceptability. Measuring equity is an important aspect to identify and target population groups at risk of service inequity. Innovative MNH interventions will need innovative

Advancing innovation in health care leadership: a collaborative experience.

Science.gov (United States)

Garcia, Victor H; Meek, Kevin L; Wilson, Kimburli A

2011-01-01

The changing framework of today's health care system requires leaders to be increasingly innovative in how they approach their daily functions and responsibilities. Sustaining and advancing a level of innovation that already exists can be challenging for health care administrators with the demands of time and resource limitations. Using collaboration to bring new-age teaching and disciplines to front-line leadership, one hospital was able to reinvigorate a culture of innovation through multiple levels and disciplines of the organization. The Innovation Certification Course provided nursing leaders and other managers' an evidence-drive approach, new principles and useful strategies of innovative leadership and graduate program education.

Type III methyltransferase M.NgoAX from Neisseria gonorrhoeae FA1090 regulates biofilm formation and human cell invasion

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Agnieszka eKwiatek

2015-12-01

Full Text Available Neisseria gonorrhoeae is the etiological factor of the sexually transmitted gonorrhea disease that may lead, under specific conditions, to systemic infections. The gonococcal genome encodes many Restriction Modification (RM systems, which main biological role is to defend the pathogen from potentially harmful foreign DNA. However, RM systems seem also to be involved in several other functions. In this study, we examined the effect of inactivation the N. gonorrhoeae FA1090 ngo0545 gene encoding M.NgoAX methyltransferase on the global gene expression, biofilm formation, interactions with human epithelial host cells and overall bacterial growth. Expression microarrays showed at least a two-fold deregulation of a total of 121 genes in the NgoAX knock-out mutant compared to the wt strain under standard grow conditions. As determined by the assay with crystal violet, the NgoAX knock-out strain formed a slightly larger biofilm biomass per cell than the wt strain (OD570/600 = 13.8  2.24 and 9.35  2.06, respectively. SCLM observations showed that the biofilm formed by the gonococcal ngo0545 gene mutant is more relaxed and dispersed than the one formed by the wt strain. Thickness of the biofilm formed by both strains was 48.3 (14.9 µm for the mutant and 28.6 (4.0 µm for the wt. This more relaxed feature of the biofilm in respect to adhesion and bacterial interactions seems advantageous for pathogenesis of the NgoAX-deficient gonococci at the stage of human epithelial cell invasion. Indeed, the overall adhesion of mutant bacterial cells to human cells was lower than adhesion of the wt gonococci (adhesion index = 0.672 ( 0.2 and 2.15 ( 1.53, respectively; yet, a higher number of mutant than wt bacteria were found inside the Hec-1-B epithelial cells (invasion index = 3.38 ( 0.93  105 for mutant and 4.67 ( 3.09  104 for the wt strain. These results indicate that NgoAX-deficient cells have lower ability to attach to human cells

mHealth & Wellness Innovation Ecosystem (Section C: Implementation instance)

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Botha, Adele

2016-12-01

Full Text Available Against the background of the conceptualisation of a Digital Health Innovation Ecosystem within the South African context, this chapter will present a localised mHealth & Wellness Innovation Ecosystem. As outlined in the previous chapter, a...

Smart health and innovation: facilitating health-related behaviour change.

Science.gov (United States)

Redfern, J

2017-08-01

Non-communicable diseases (NCD) are the leading cause of death globally. Smart health technology and innovation is a potential strategy for increasing reach and for facilitating health behaviour change. Despite rapid growth in the availability and affordability of technology there remains a paucity of published and robust research in the area as it relates to health. The objective of the present paper is to review and provide a snapshot of a variety of contemporary examples of smart health strategies with a focus on evidence and research as it relates to prevention with a CVD management lens. In the present analysis, five examples will be discussed and they include a physician-directed strategy, consumer directed strategies, a public health approach and a screening strategy that utilises external hardware that connects to a smartphone. In conclusion, NCD have common risk factors and all have an association with nutrition and health. Smart health and innovation is evolving rapidly and may help with diagnosis, treatment and management. While on-going research, development and knowledge is needed, the growth of technology development and utilisation offers opportunities to reach more people and achieve better health outcomes at local, national and international levels.

Tracking uptake of innovations from the European Union Public Health Programme.

Science.gov (United States)

Voss, Margaretha; Alexanderson, Kristina; McCarthy, Mark

2013-11-01

The European Commission developed the Public Health Programme to enable cross-national innovation and transfer in fields of health information, health threats and health promotion. PHIRE (Public Health Innovation and Research in Europe), a collaboration of the European Public Health Association (EUPHA) with seven partners, addressed the uptake of these public health innovation projects at country level. EUPHA thematic sections lead on areas of public health practice and research and experts can choose to be section members. The section presidents of seven sections chose eight European public health projects, starting in the EU Public Health Programme in 2003-05, that provided new knowledge for practice and covered a majority of the EU countries. A web-based questionnaire recorded country informants' (CIs) perceptions of uptake, assessed as relevance and dissemination to a range of public and non-governmental organizations. 108 CIs individually described the eight innovations in an average of 14 (46%) of the 30 European countries. Three of the eight innovations were considered of high relevance by >60% of respondents and at least 70% of informants considered seven of the eight innovation projects as of high or moderate relevance. Dissemination was noted across governmental, professional and academic settings, with high impact on knowledge/awareness for at least 30% of CIs. Some projects had uptake within the policy cycle in particular countries and connected strongly with academics and professionals. Projects working at local level had less visibility nationally and some projects were unknown to national respondents. European Union funding for public health can contribute to cross-national knowledge transfer and uptake of innovations. More attention is needed to classify, characterize and identify public health innovations and to demonstrate their direct contribution to European health and well-being.

The incentive effects of missions - Evidence from experiments with NGO employees and students

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gerhards, Leonie

2015-01-01

This paper studies the incentive effects of an organization׳s ‘mission’ on the effort provision of agents. Across treatments, I exogenously vary how much the agents׳ and their projects׳ missions match. In the first study, NGO employees are assigned the role of agents in an online, one-shot, princ......This paper studies the incentive effects of an organization׳s ‘mission’ on the effort provision of agents. Across treatments, I exogenously vary how much the agents׳ and their projects׳ missions match. In the first study, NGO employees are assigned the role of agents in an online, one......-agent game with random matching, I do not find a motivational effect of missions, unlike in my first two studies....

Prioritising health service innovation investments using public preferences: a discrete choice experiment.

Science.gov (United States)

Erdem, Seda; Thompson, Carl

2014-08-28

Prioritising scarce resources for investment in innovation by publically funded health systems is unavoidable. Many healthcare systems wish to foster transparency and accountability in the decisions they make by incorporating the public in decision-making processes. This paper presents a unique conceptual approach exploring the public's preferences for health service innovations by viewing healthcare innovations as 'bundles' of characteristics. This decompositional approach allows policy-makers to compare numerous competing health service innovations without repeatedly administering surveys for specific innovation choices. A Discrete Choice Experiment (DCE) was used to elicit preferences. Individuals chose from presented innovation options that they believe the UK National Health Service (NHS) should invest the most in. Innovations differed according to: (i) target population; (ii) target age; (iii) implementation time; (iv) uncertainty associated with their likely effects; (v) potential health benefits; and, (vi) cost to a taxpayer. This approach fosters multidimensional decision-making, rather than imposing a single decision criterion (e.g., cost, target age) in prioritisation. Choice data was then analysed using scale-adjusted Latent Class models to investigate variability in preferences and scale and valuations amongst respondents. Three latent classes with considerable heterogeneity in the preferences were present. Each latent class is composed of two consumer subgroups varying in the level of certainty in their choices. All groups preferred scientifically proven innovations, those with potential health benefits that cost less. There were, however, some important differences in their preferences for innovation investment choices: Class-1 (54%) prefers innovations benefitting adults and young people and does not prefer innovations targeting people with 'drug addiction' and 'obesity'. Class- 2 (34%) prefers innovations targeting 'cancer' patients only and has

Science-based health innovation in Ghana: health entrepreneurs point the way to a new development path.

Science.gov (United States)

Al-Bader, Sara; Daar, Abdallah S; Singer, Peter A

2010-12-13

Science, technology and innovation have long played a role in Ghana's vision for development, including in improving its health outcomes. However, so far little research has been conducted on Ghana's capacity for health innovation to address local diseases. This research aims to fill that gap, mapping out the key actors involved, highlighting examples of indigenous innovation, setting out the challenges ahead and outlining recommendations for strengthening Ghana's health innovation system. Case study research methodology was used. Data were collected through reviews of academic literature and policy documents and through open-ended, face-to-face interviews with 48 people from across the science-based health innovation system. Data was collected over three visits to Ghana from February 2007 to August 2008, and stakeholders engaged subsequently. Ghana has strengths which could underpin science-based health innovation in the future, including health and biosciences research institutions with strong foreign linkages and donor support; a relatively strong regulatory system which is building capacity in other West African countries; the beginnings of new funding forms such as venture capital; and the return of professionals from the diaspora, bringing expertise and contacts. Some health products and services are already being developed in Ghana by individual entrepreneurs, which are innovative in the sense of being new to the country and, in some cases, the continent. They include essential medicines, raw pharmaceutical materials, new formulations for pediatric use and plant medicines at various stages of development. While Ghana has many institutions concerned with health research and its commercialization, their ability to work together to address clear health goals is low. If Ghana is to capitalize on its assets, including political and macroeconomic stability which underpin investment in health enterprises, it needs to improve the health innovation environment

NGO Management Case Study: Civitas Foundation for Civil Society

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ramona BERE

2000-06-01

Full Text Available As idealistic as it may sound, the truth is that NGOs act to make the world a better place. They often do that by taking action in areas where the government fails to succeed or does not do a very good job. In this context I would like to present a very special NGO: CIVITAS Foundation for Civil Society, evaluating its governance and services.

Catalyzing healthcare transformation with digital health: Performance indicators and lessons learned from a Digital Health Innovation Group.

Science.gov (United States)

Tseng, Jocelyn; Samagh, Sonia; Fraser, Donna; Landman, Adam B

2018-06-01

Despite considerable investment in digital health (DH) companies and a growing DH ecosystem, there are multiple challenges to testing and implementing innovative solutions. Health systems have recognized the potential of DH and have formed DH innovation centers. However, limited information is available on DH innovation center processes, best practices, or outcomes. This case report describes a DH innovation center process that can be replicated across health systems and defines and benchmarks process indicators to assess DH innovation center performance. The Brigham and Women's Hospital's Digital Health Innovation Group (DHIG) accelerates DH innovations from idea to pilot safely and efficiently using a structured process. Fifty-four DH innovations were accelerated by the DHIG process between July 2014 and December 2016. In order to measure effectiveness of the DHIG process, key process indicators were defined as 1) number of solutions that completed each DHIG phase and 2) length of time to complete each phase. Twenty-three DH innovations progressed to pilot stage and 13 innovations were terminated after barriers to pilot implementation were identified by the DHIG process. For 4 DH solutions that executed a pilot, the average time for innovations to proceed from DHIG intake to pilot initiation was 9 months. Overall, the DHIG is a reproducible process that addresses key roadblocks in DH innovation within health systems. To our knowledge, this is the first report to describe DH innovation process indicators and results within an academic health system. Therefore, there is no published data to compare our results with the results of other DH innovation centers. Standardized data collection and indicator reporting could allow benchmark comparisons across institutions. Additional opportunities exist for the validation of DH solution effectiveness and for translational support from pilot to implementation. These are critical steps to advance DH technologies and

In search of the quickest way to disseminate health care innovations

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Guus Schrijvers

2003-10-01

Full Text Available Research Question: Innovations in health care are slowly disseminated in The Netherlands and elsewhere. That's why the researchers defined their research question: What is the quickest way of disseminating health care innovations? Research method: The design was a comparative, qualitative case study. The researchers invited a group of 52 authors to describe their 21 health care innovations. All case descriptions were published in a book of 261 pages [2]. Results: Six types of innovations were distinguished. Most innovations simultaneously improved quality from the patient's point of view (18 out of 21 cases, professional pride (18/21 and speed of introduction (16/21. Clinical outcomes were better or comparable in 13 of the 21 cases. Brainstorm sessions took place with the innovators and the 22 experts on the quickest way to disseminate the innovations more widely in The Netherlands. These sessions looked for the critical success factors for the dissemination of the 21 projects and identified nine. The following factors were identified: 1. A clear distribution of responsibilities between professionals within the innovation (20/21 2. Enough educational programs about the innovations for the professionals (18/21 3. Adequate ICT support for the running of the innovations (15/21 4. Suitable publicity for the innovations (12/21 5. An adequate payment system for innovative care providers (7/21 6. The right size of catchment's area for the innovations (6/21 7. Enough professional freedom to adopt the innovation (5/21 8. Fast managerial and public decision-making about the adoption of the innovation (3/21 9. The embedding of the innovations in quality management assurance policy (1/21. Discussion: The results of the study had some influence on the political health agenda in The Netherlands, leading to greater emphasis on innovations and quality of care.

Convergent innovation for sustainable economic growth and affordable universal health care: innovating the way we innovate.

Science.gov (United States)

Dubé, Laurette; Jha, Srivardhini; Faber, Aida; Struben, Jeroen; London, Ted; Mohapatra, Archisman; Drager, Nick; Lannon, Chris; Joshi, P K; McDermott, John

2014-12-01

This paper introduces convergent innovation (CI) as a form of meta-innovation-an innovation in the way we innovate. CI integrates human and economic development outcomes, through behavioral and ecosystem transformation at scale, for sustainable prosperity and affordable universal health care within a whole-of-society paradigm. To this end, CI combines technological and social innovation (including organizational, social process, financial, and institutional), with a special focus on the most underserved populations. CI takes a modular approach that convenes around roadmaps for real world change-a portfolio of loosely coupled complementary partners from the business community, civil society, and the public sector. Roadmaps serve as collaborative platforms for focused, achievable, and time-bound projects to provide scalable, sustainable, and resilient solutions to complex challenges, with benefits both to participating partners and to society. In this paper, we first briefly review the literature on technological innovation that sets the foundations of CI and motivates its feasibility. We then describe CI, its building blocks, and enabling conditions for deployment and scaling up, illustrating its operational forms through examples of existing CI-sensitive innovation. © 2014 The New York Academy of Sciences.

Antibiotic innovation for future public health needs.

Science.gov (United States)

Theuretzbacher, U

2017-10-01

The public health threat of antibiotic resistance has gained attention at the highest political levels globally, and recommendations on how to respond are being considered for implementation. Among the recommended responses being explored for their feasibility is the introduction of economic incentives to promote research and development of new antibiotics. There is broad agreement that public investment should stimulate innovation and be linked to policies promoting sustainable and equitable access to antibiotics. Though commonly used, the term 'innovation' is not based on a common understanding. This article aims to initiate discussion on the meaning of 'innovation' in this context. Literature and expert opinion. As the definition of a novel class (novel scaffold, novel pharmacophore), a novel target (novel binding site) and a novel mode of action-the three traditional criteria for 'innovation' in this context-may be confounded by the complexities of antibacterial drug discovery, a biological and outcome-oriented definition of innovation is presented to initiate discussion. Such an expanded definition of innovation in this specific context is based on the overarching requirement that a drug not be affected by cross-resistance to existing drugs in the organisms and indications for which it is intended to be used, and that it have low potential for high-frequency, high-level single-step resistance if intended as a single drug therapy. Policy makers, public health authorities and funders could use such a comprehensive definition of innovation to prioritize where publicly funded incentives should be applied. Copyright © 2017 European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Innovation in mental health services: what are the key components of success?

Science.gov (United States)

Brooks, Helen; Pilgrim, David; Rogers, Anne

2011-10-26

Service development innovation in health technology and practice is viewed as a pressing need within the field of mental health yet is relatively poorly understood. Macro-level theories have been criticised for their limited explanatory power and they may not be appropriate for understanding local and fine-grained uncertainties of services and barriers to the sustainability of change. This study aimed to identify contextual influences inhibiting or promoting the acceptance and integration of innovations in mental health services in both National Health Service (NHS) and community settings. A comparative study using qualitative and case study data collection methods, including semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders and follow-up telephone interviews over a one-year period. The analysis was informed by learning organisation theory. Drawn from 11 mental health innovation projects within community, voluntary and NHS settings, 65 participants were recruited including service users, commissioners, health and non-health professionals, managers, and caregivers. The methods deployed in this evaluation focused on process-outcome links within and between the 11 projects. Key barriers to innovation included resistance from corporate departments and middle management, complexity of the innovation, and the availability and access to resources on a prospective basis within the host organisation. The results informed the construction of a proposed model of innovation implementation within mental health services. The main components of which are context, process, and outcomes. The study produced a model of conducive and impeding factors drawn from the composite picture of 11 innovative mental health projects, and this is discussed in light of relevant literature. The model provides a rich agenda to consider for services wanting to innovate or adopt innovations from elsewhere. The evaluation suggested the importance of studying innovation with a focus on context, process

E-health, health systems and social innovation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Brem, Alexander; Sliwa, Sophie Isabel; Agarwal, Nivedita

2017-01-01

This paper explores telecare as one of the practical applications in the field of e-health. Using 11 expert interviews the study evaluates development of cross-national analogies between the different institutional contexts of health systems in Germany, Austria, and Denmark. Telecare is treated a...... to be driving socially innovative solutions. Implications for research and practice, as well as future research directions, are elaborated....... as a set of ideas regarding future processes in health and home care services, involving technological solutions, starting to change stakeholders' behaviour, work practices, and social roles. A system-centric framework is proposed to evaluate the interdependencies between telecare, the changing...

A scoping review of digital health innovation ecosystems in developed and developing countries

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Iyawa, GE

2017-05-01

Full Text Available Digital health innovation ecosystems describe the need to incorporate the components of digital health, innovation and digital ecosystems in administering healthcare services. Reviewing the evidence of digital health, innovation and digital...

Impact Of Health Care Delivery System Innovations On Total Cost Of Care.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Kevin W; Bir, Anupa; Freeman, Nikki L B; Koethe, Benjamin C; Cohen, Julia; Day, Timothy J

2017-03-01

Using delivery system innovations to advance health care reform continues to be of widespread interest. However, it is difficult to generalize about the success of specific types of innovations, since they have been examined in only a few studies. To gain a broader perspective, we analyzed the results of forty-three ambulatory care programs funded by the first round of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation's Health Care Innovations Awards. The innovations' impacts on total cost of care were estimated by independent evaluators using multivariable difference-in-differences models. Through the first two years, most of the innovations did not show a significant effect on total cost of care. Using meta-regression, we assessed the effects on costs of five common components of these innovations. Innovations that used health information technology or community health workers achieved the greatest cost savings. Savings were also relatively large in programs that targeted clinically fragile patients-clinically complex populations at risk for disease progression. While the magnitude of these effects was often substantial, none achieved conventional levels of significance in our analyses. Meta-analyses of a larger number of delivery system innovations are needed to more clearly establish their potential for patient care cost savings. Project HOPE—The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.

PHIRE (Public Health Innovation and Research in Europe): methods, structures and evaluation.

Science.gov (United States)

Barnhoorn, Floris; McCarthy, Mark; Devillé, Walter; Alexanderson, Kristina; Voss, Margaretha; Conceição, Claudia

2013-11-01

Public Health Innovation and Research in Europe (PHIRE), building on previous European collaborative projects, was developed to assess national uptake and impacts of European public health innovations, to describe national public health research programmes, strategies and structures and to develop participation of researchers through the organizational structures of the European Public Health Association (EUPHA). This article describes the methods used. PHIRE was led by EUPHA with seven partner organisations over 30 months. It was conceived to engage the organisation of EUPHA--working through its thematic Sections, and through its national public health associations--and assess innovation and research across 30 European countries. Public health research was defined broadly as health research at population and organisational level. There were seven Work Packages (three covering coordination and four for technical aspects) led by partners and coordinated through management meetings. Seven EUPHA Sections identified eight innovations within the projects funded by the Public Health Programme of the European Commission Directorate for Health and Consumers. Country informants, identified through EUPHA thematic Sections, reported on national uptake of the innovations in eight public health projects supported by the European Union Public Health Programme. Four PHIRE partners, each taking a regional sector of Europe, worked with the public health associations and other informants to describe public health research programmes, calls and systems. A classification was created for the national public health research programmes and calls in 2010. The internal and external evaluations were supportive. PHIRE described public health innovations and research across Europe through national experts. More work is needed to conceptualize and define public health 'innovations' and to develop theories and methods for the assessment of their uptake and impacts at country and cross

Case of ex-Yugoslavia and struggle for its interpretation: Case of NGO's in Serbia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Radojičić Mirjana

2008-01-01

Full Text Available In this article author considers the case of disintegration/decomposition of Yugoslavia from the angle of struggle for interpretation that several NGO's have fought on Serbian public scene. Clue of whole matter is in a kind of politic of interpretation engaged by these NGO's as for the near Yugoslav past. After the brief summary of this kind of interpretation author asks for key tenets of alleged "new politicity" that have been formed as a model of civil activity in Serbia during the last decade. In concluding part of the article geopolitical dimension of that phenomena is pointed out as well as importance of its precise legislation needed to restrict this kind of practice considerably.

Challenges to value-enhancing innovation in health care delivery: commonalities and contrasts with innovation in drugs and devices

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Garber, Steven

2011-01-01

.... health policymakers. The role of innovation in advancing these social goals is controversial, with many seeing innovation as a major cause of cost growth and many others viewing innovation as crucial for improving...

Civil society organisations, social innovation and health research in Europe.

Science.gov (United States)

Beinare, Dace; McCarthy, Mark

2012-12-01

European Union strategies and programmes identify research and innovation as a critical dimension for future economic and social development. While European research policy emphasizes support for industry, the health field includes not-for-profit civil society organisations (CSOs) providing social innovation. Yet, the perspectives of CSOs towards health research in Europe are not well understood. STEPS (Strengthening Engagement in Public Health Research) was funded by the European Commission's Science in Society research programme. Within the study, we interviewed by telephone respondents of 13 European health CSOs, which represented collectively local and national organizations. Research was valued positively by the respondents. Health CSOs did not seek to do research themselves, but recognized the opportunity of funds in this field and welcomed the possibility of collaborating in research, of using the results from research and of providing input to research agendas. Links between research and users provides knowledge for the public and improves impacts on policy. Research and evaluation can help in demonstrating the benefit of innovative activities, and give support and legitimacy. However, the cultures of, and incentives for, researchers and health CSOs are different, and collaboration requires building trust, a shared language and for the power relations and objectives to match. Health CSOs contribute social innovation in organising services and activities such as advocacy that cannot be satisfactorily met by industry. Engaging CSOs in research and innovation will strengthen the European Research Area.

Public Health Innovation and Research in Europe: introduction to the supplement.

Science.gov (United States)

McCarthy, Mark; Zeegers Paget, Dineke

2013-11-01

PHIRE (Public Health Innovation and Research in Europe) was developed for the national member associations and individual researchers of the European Public Health Association (EUPHA) to engage collectively with the health research agenda in Europe. It was co-funded by the European Commission's Directorate for Health and Consumers within the EU Health Programme. It was coordinated by EUPHA in a partnership of eight organizations. This article introduces the Supplement in the European Journal of Public Health presenting the results of PHIRE. PHIRE used mixed methods to collect data across 30 European countries (European Union 27 plus Iceland, Norway and Switzerland). Seven thematic Sections of EUPHA identified eight cross-national public health innovation projects, and Country Informants to report on national uptake and impact of these innovations. Public health was considered broadly--health determinants and interventions, health services and practice. Through EUPHA's member national public health associations, and by direct country contacts, PHIRE described country public health research strategies and structures, reviewed calls and programmes for research in 1 year and organized stakeholder workshops. PHIRE was reported to the European Commission, and the component reports placed on the EUPHA web page. A draft of the Final Summary Report was sent by email for commentary by selected experts. PHIRE data from the work packages were organized into eight themes for the Supplement. Through the EUPHA thematic Sections, experts described the uptake and impact of eight innovation projects from the EU Health Programme. National reports indicated a positive impact of the innovations in public health 'markets'. Through national public health associations, 75 programmes and calls for public health research were found for 2010, but systems are not comparable and nor is information exchanged or coordinated. Only a few countries have public health research strategies. Having

Transnational NGO, Development and Global Governance

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Li, Xing; Farah, Abdulkadir Osman

2014-01-01

Empirically recent global developments have shown that transnational NGOs operate in between civic mobilization dimension to organizational and institutional dimensions depending on the particular contextual event. NGOs have demonstrated capabilities to move between civic mobilization grass root...... orientations and top down organizational platforms (Stachursky, 2013). In this regard the state remains significant in the process of NGO activities. Although globalizations in the form of mobility and technological advancement diminished state monopoly, NGOs continue to struggle overcoming national priorities...... not just for acquiring funds but also for engaging in an increasingly complex but still state centric world. We can nonetheless agree on the point that Transnational NGOs as non-state actors and have the capacity to simultaneously operate local, global and transnational. On one way these are competent...

Technological innovations and the rise of social inequalities in health.

Science.gov (United States)

Weiss, Daniel; Eikemo, Terje Andreas

2017-11-01

Social inequalities in health have been categorised as a human-rights issue that requires action. Unfortunately, these inequalities are on the rise in many countries, including welfare states. Various theories have been offered to explain the persistence (and rise) of these inequalities over time, including the social determinants of health and fundamental cause theory. Interestingly, the rise of modern social inequalities in health has come at a time of great technological innovation. This article addresses whether these technological innovations are significantly influencing the persistence of modern social inequalities in health. A theoretical argument is offered for this potential connection and is discussed alongside the typical social determinants of health perspective and the increasingly popular fundamental cause perspective. This is followed by a proposed research agenda for further investigation of the potential role that technological innovations may play in influencing social inequalities in health.

Servant leadership: a case study of a Canadian health care innovator

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Vanderpyl TH

2012-02-01

Full Text Available Tim H VanderpylSchool of Global Leadership, Regent University, Virginia Beach, VA, USAAbstract: Both servant leadership and innovation are easier to theorize than to actually implement in practice. This article presents a case study of a Canadian health care executive who led a remarkable turnaround of St Michael's Health Centre, a floundering and almost bankrupt nursing home. In less than 7 years, Kevin Cowan turned around the finances and changed numerous broken relationships into strategic alliances. Under his leadership, St Michael's Health Centre went from being one of the most underperforming health care organizations in Canada, to one of the most innovative. This article describes some of Cowan's strategies and argues that a servant leadership approach has a direct impact on an organization's ability to innovate. As far as the author is aware, this is the first published article on this specific change effort, which presents a unique perspective on the topics of servant leadership and innovation.Keywords: servant leadership, innovation, Canada, health care, case study

Developing a Questionnaire to Measure Perceived Attributes of eHealth Innovations

Science.gov (United States)

Atkinson, Nancy L.

2007-01-01

Objectives: To design a valid and reliable questionnaire to assess perceived attributes of technology-based health education innovations. Methods: College students in 12 personal health courses reviewed a prototype eHealth intervention using a 30-item instrument based upon diffusion theory's perceived attributes of an innovation. Results:…

Diffusion of e-health innovations in 'post-conflict' settings: a qualitative study on the personal experiences of health workers.

Science.gov (United States)

Woodward, Aniek; Fyfe, Molly; Handuleh, Jibril; Patel, Preeti; Godman, Brian; Leather, Andrew; Finlayson, Alexander

2014-04-23

Technological innovations have the potential to strengthen human resources for health and improve access and quality of care in challenging 'post-conflict' contexts. However, analyses on the adoption of technology for health (that is, 'e-health') and whether and how e-health can strengthen a health workforce in these settings have been limited so far. This study explores the personal experiences of health workers using e-health innovations in selected post-conflict situations. This study had a cross-sectional qualitative design. Telephone interviews were conducted with 12 health workers, from a variety of cadres and stages in their careers, from four post-conflict settings (Liberia, West Bank and Gaza, Sierra Leone and Somaliland) in 2012. Everett Roger's diffusion of innovation-decision model (that is, knowledge, persuasion, decision, implementation, contemplation) guided the thematic analysis. All health workers interviewed held positive perceptions of e-health, related to their beliefs that e-health can help them to access information and communicate with other health workers. However, understanding of the scope of e-health was generally limited, and often based on innovations that health workers have been introduced through by their international partners. Health workers reported a range of engagement with e-health innovations, mostly for communication (for example, email) and educational purposes (for example, online learning platforms). Poor, unreliable and unaffordable Internet was a commonly mentioned barrier to e-health use. Scaling-up existing e-health partnerships and innovations were suggested starting points to increase e-health innovation dissemination. Results from this study showed ICT based e-health innovations can relieve information and communication needs of health workers in post-conflict settings. However, more efforts and investments, preferably driven by healthcare workers within the post-conflict context, are needed to make e-health more

Standardization and Innovation for Smart e-Health Monitoring Devices

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mihovska, Albena D.; Kyriazakos, Sofoklis; Mihaylov, Mihail Rumenov

2015-01-01

The challenges faced by standardization in relation to the potential of wireless communication technologies to deliver lower cost, higher efficiency, enhanced quality of experience and diversified smart e-Health services, are multi-fold and determined by the complexity of the myriad of emerging...... user and usage scenarios. In addition, there is the challenge of protection of privacy and the maintenance of trust. This paper aims to show the evidence of the correlation between standardization and innovation in the area of ehealth technology. It describes a capability framework proposed...... for the delivery of e-Health services in support of independent living. The proposed framework incorporates innovative research and standardized solutions. The paper addresses the correlation between standardization and innovation, in particular for the area of e-Health. It analyzes the potential of research...

MANAGEMENT OF INNOVATION IN HEALTH CARE AT THE REGIONAL LEVEL

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ye. G. Totskaya

2014-01-01

Full Text Available The paper reviews topical issues of organization and management of innovative activity in the regional health care system.Objective. Development and scientific substantiation of a conceptual model of managing innovation in the regional health care system, introduction of institutional mechanisms for its implementation, and evaluation of their efficacy in using diagnosis and treatment technologies. Objectives of the study included reviewing the organization status and problems hampering the development, identification of prospects, and justification for appropriate changes in innovation in healthcare system and medical science at the regional level.Material and methods. To conduct a comprehensive assessment of the status and meet challenges of innovation promotion, a methodology for social-hygienic research was worked out including bibliographic and analytical methods, situational analysis, sociological and economic methods, expert assessment, methods for quality management system audit in accordance with ISO 19011:2002, IDEFO function modeling (RD IDEF0-2000, and organizational modeling. The study was based on the analysis of foreign and domestic literature, statistics, methods for managerial modeling, as well as management experience (including innovative methodological approaches gained by Novosibirsk Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics named after Ya.L. Tsivyan which meets the requirements for a platform for research and innovative product reproduction, including research, clinical, organizational, and managerial aspects. Other facilities were considered in conjunction with the leading innovative platform.Results. The paper presents a scientifically based model of innovative medical environment with its elements as subjects, each with a set of functions. Conceptual model for management includes structuring (resource, processes, and quality management; application of international standards and strategic management mechanisms

[Health care innovation from a territorial perspective: a call for a new approach].

Science.gov (United States)

Costa, Laís Silveira; Gadelha, Carlos Augusto Grabois; Maldonado, José

2012-12-01

Innovation plays an increasingly important role in health care, partly because it is responsible for a significant share of national investment in research and development, and partly because of its industrial and service provision base, which provides a conduit to future technology. The relationship between health care and development is also strengthened as a result of the leading role of health care in generating innovation. Nevertheless, Brazil's health care production base is persistently weak, hindering both universal provision of health care services and international competitiveness. This article, based on the theoretical framework of Political Economy and innovation systems, has sought to identify variables in subnational contexts that influence the dynamic of innovation generation in health care. To this end, the theoretical approach used lies on the assumption that innovation is a contextualized social process and that the production base in healthcare will remain weak if new variables involved in the dynamic of innovation are not taken into account.

Health and innovation: economic dynamics and Welfare State in Brazil

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Carlos Augusto Grabois Gadelha

Full Text Available Abstract: The effective enforcement of the access to healthcare as fundamental right requires an important theoretical and political effort at linking the often contradictory economic and social dimensions of development. This study suggests the need for a systemic view of policies related to the industrial base and innovation in health and the construction of the Brazilian Unified National Health System (SUS. The authors investigate the relations between health, innovation, and development, seeking to show and update the political, economic, and social determinants of the recent Brazilian experience with the Health Economic-Industrial Complex (HEIC. They discuss how the agenda for innovation and domestic industrial production in health gained a central place in the project for construction of the SUS. The article thus seeks to link inherent issues from the agenda for development, production, and innovation to social policy in healthcare, as observed in recent years, and based on this analysis, points to political and conceptual challenges for implementing the SUS, especially as regards strengthening its technological and industrial base. As a byproduct, the article develops an analytical and factual focus on the consolidation of the HEIC in Brazil, both as a dynamic vector of industrial development, generating investment, income, employment, and innovations, and as a decisive element for reducing vulnerability and structural dependence in health. The authors aim to show that strengthening the SUS and orienting it to social needs is an essential part of building a social Welfare State in Brazil.

Global Lessons In Frugal Innovation To Improve Health Care Delivery In The United States.

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Bhatti, Yasser; Taylor, Andrea; Harris, Matthew; Wadge, Hester; Escobar, Erin; Prime, Matt; Patel, Hannah; Carter, Alexander W; Parston, Greg; Darzi, Ara W; Udayakumar, Krishna

2017-11-01

In a 2015 global study of low-cost or frugal innovations, we identified five leading innovations that scaled successfully in their original contexts and that may provide insights for scaling such innovations in the United States. We describe common themes among these diverse innovations, critical factors for their translation to the United States to improve the efficiency and quality of health care, and lessons for the implementation and scaling of other innovations. We highlight promising trends in the United States that support adapting these innovations, including growing interest in moving care out of health care facilities and into community and home settings; the growth of alternative payment models and incentives to experiment with new approaches to population health and care delivery; and the increasing use of diverse health professionals, such as community health workers and advanced practice providers. Our findings should inspire policy makers and health care professionals and inform them about the potential for globally sourced frugal innovations to benefit US health care.

[Health technology assessment: a multidisciplinary approach for selecting innovations in the health service].

Science.gov (United States)

Cavallo, Maria Caterina

2013-01-01

Technological evolution and the increasing requests of a more qualified health care have challenged politicians to evaluate the economical sustainability of proposed innovations. The objective of government health policies is to guarantee real advances in the quality of care to all citizens. Since 1965, independent research centers have analyzed this issue for the US Congress. In 1973, Congress endorsed the establishment of an Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) to discover the best strategies for evaluating such advances. OTA have proposed the following criteria to identify possible beneficial innovations to be introduced into routine health care: effectiveness, safeness, worth, costs, cost-effectiveness ratio and cost patient-benefit ratio. This review analyzes in detail the pathway that each medical innovation follows in order to identify which technological evolutions might prove to be truly beneficial and sustainable for the community.

Organizational innovation in health care - as a process

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Tatjana Mlakar

2008-02-01

Full Text Available Slovenia, like most countries of the modern world, spends toomuch on its public health care and supplies too little public healthcare services for the government, economists, politicians, and citizensto be happy. The many reforms of the public health care, e.g.in Slovenia, seem to be inefficient, one after the other, in solvingthis problem. Reforms have been conceived with a too poor considerationof the law of the requisite holism in decision preparation,decisions making and decision implementation. The articletackles procedure of implementation of reforms as inventions aresupposed to become innovations in the public health care organizationand management, rather than reforms’ content. Combinationof the absorption capacity, innovation promotion and diffusion issuggested for the requisite holism of implementation.

In search of the quickest way to disseminate health care innovations

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Schrijvers, G.; Oudendijk, Nico; Vries, Pety de

2003-01-01

Research Question: Innovations in health care are slowly disseminated in The Netherlands and elsewhere. That's why the researchers defined their research question: What is the quickest way of disseminating health care innovations? Research method: The design was a comparative, qualitative case

ATTAINING UNIVERSAL ACCESS: PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP AND BUSINESS-NGO PARTNERSHIP

OpenAIRE

Chowdhury, Shyamal K.

2002-01-01

This paper evaluates two alternative mechanisms, Public-Private Partnership in Peru and Business-NGO Partnership in Bangladesh, that provide rural people with access to telecommunications. The two mechanisms that are examined here are considered as two best practices in the provision of rural telecommunications in the context of developing countries. Under two geographically distinct market segments, rural market characterized by low per-subscriber revenue and urban market characterized by hi...

Open Innovation at NASA: A New Business Model for Advancing Human Health and Performance Innovations

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Davis, Jeffrey R.; Richard, Elizabeth E.; Keeton, Kathryn E.

2014-01-01

This paper describes a new business model for advancing NASA human health and performance innovations and demonstrates how open innovation shaped its development. A 45 percent research and technology development budget reduction drove formulation of a strategic plan grounded in collaboration. We describe the strategy execution, including adoption and results of open innovation initiatives, the challenges of cultural change, and the development of virtual centers and a knowledge management tool to educate and engage the workforce and promote cultural change.

Innovations in food technology for health.

Science.gov (United States)

Hsieh, Yun-Hwa Peggy; Ofori, Jack Appiah

2007-01-01

Modern nutritional science is providing ever more information on the functions and mechanisms of specific food components in health promotion and/or disease prevention. In response to demands from increasingly health conscious consumers, the global trend is for food industries to translate nutritional information into consumer reality by developing food products that provide not only superior sensory appeal but also nutritional and health benefits. Today's busy life styles are also driving the development of healthy convenience foods. Recent innovations in food technologies have led to the use of many traditional technologies, such as fermentation, extraction, encapsulation, fat replacement, and enzyme technology, to produce new health food ingredients, reduce or remove undesirable food components, add specific nutrient or functional ingredients, modify food compositions, mask undesirable flavors or stabilize ingredients. Modern biotechnology has even revolutionized the way foods are created. Recent discoveries in gene science are making it possible to manipulate the components in natural foods. In combination with biofermentation, desirable natural compounds can now be produced in large amounts at a low cost and with little environmental impact. Nanotechnology is also beginning to find potential applications in the area of food and agriculture. Although the use of new technologies in the production of health foods is often a cause for concern, the possibility that innovative food technology will allow us to produce a wide variety of food with enhanced flavor and texture, while at the same time conferring multiple health benefits on the consumer, is very exciting.

Science-based health innovation in Rwanda: unlocking the potential of a late bloomer

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Hughes Mike

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background This paper describes and analyses Rwanda’s science-based health product ‘innovation system’, highlighting examples of indigenous innovation and good practice. We use an innovation systems framework, which takes into account the wide variety of stakeholders and knowledge flows contributing to the innovation process. The study takes into account the destruction of the country’s scientific infrastructure and human capital that occurred during the 1994 genocide, and describes government policy, research institutes and universities, the private sector, and NGOs that are involved in health product innovation in Rwanda. Methods Case study research methodology was used. Data were collected through reviews of academic literature and policy documents and through open-ended, face-to-face interviews with 38 people from across the science-based health innovation system. Data was collected over two visits to Rwanda between November – December 2007 and in May 2008. A workshop was held in Kigali on May 23rd and May 24th 2009 to validate the findings. A business plan was then developed to operationalize the findings. Results and discussion The results of the study show that Rwanda has strong government will to support health innovation both through its political leadership and through government policy documents. However, it has a very weak scientific base as most of its scientific infrastructure as well as human capital were destroyed during the 1994 genocide. The regulatory agency is weak and its nascent private sector is ill-equipped to drive health innovation. In addition, there are no linkages between the various actors in the country’s health innovation system i.e between research institutions, universities, the private sector, and government bureaucrats. Conclusions Despite the fact that the 1994 genocide destroyed most of the scientific infrastructure and human capital, the country has made remarkable progress towards

In the Name of ‘Poor and Marginalised’? Politics of NGO Activism with Dalit Women in Rural North India

OpenAIRE

Govinda, Radhika

2009-01-01

Assertion by the Dalits or ex-untouchables is one of the most signifi cant developments in contemporary India. Dalit women have actively participated in Dalit movements and in women’s and development NGOs activism. However, their voices and perspectives are said to have been marginalised by movements and NGOs alike. This article unpacks the complexities, contradictions and challenges that are produced, reproduced and subverted in NGO activism with Dalit women by examining a women’s NGO and its...

Impact of NGO training and support intervention on diarrhoea management practices in a rural community of Bangladesh: an uncontrolled, single-arm trial.

Science.gov (United States)

Rahman, Ahmed S; Islam, Mohammad Rafiqul; Koehlmoos, Tracey P; Raihan, Mohammad Jyoti; Hasan, Mohammad Mehedi; Ahmed, Tahmeed; Larson, Charles P

2014-01-01

The evolving Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) sector in Bangladesh provides health services directly, however some NGOs indirectly provide services by working with unlicensed providers. The primary objective of this study was to examine the impact of NGO training of unlicensed providers on diarrhoea management and the scale up of zinc treatment in rural populations. An uncontrolled, single-arm trial for a training and support intervention on diarrhoea outcomes was employed in a rural sub-district of Bangladesh during 2008. Two local NGOs and their catchment populations were chosen for the study. The intervention included training of unlicensed health care providers in the management of acute childhood diarrhoea, particularly emphasizing zinc treatment. In addition, community-based promotion of zinc treatment was carried out. Baseline and endline ecologic surveys were carried out in intervention and control villages to document changes in treatments received for diarrhoea in under-five children. Among surveyed household with an active or recent acute childhood diarrhoea episode, 69% sought help from a health provider. Among these, 62.8% visited an unlicensed private provider. At baseline, 23.9% vs. 22% of control and intervention group children with diarrhoea had received zinc of any type. At endline (6 months later) this had changed to 15.3% vs. 30.2%, respectively. The change in zinc coverage was significantly higher in the intervention villages (pmanagement of under-five children in rural Bangladesh households. ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02143921.

Maintaining health sector collaborations between United States non-governmental organizations and North Korea through innovation and planning.

Science.gov (United States)

Yim, Eugene S; Choi, Ricky Y; VanRooyen, Michael

2009-01-01

Humanitarian agencies in North Korea operate within a complex sociopolitical environment historically characterized by a baseline of mistrust. As a result of operating within such a heated environment, health sector collaborations between such agencies and the North Korean government have followed unpredictable courses. The factors that have contributed to successful programmatic collaborations, as perceived by United States non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and North Korean officials were investigated. A qualitative, multi-case, comparative, research design using semistructured interviews was used. Expert North Korean informants were interviewed to generate a list of factors contributing to programmatic success, defined as fulfilling mutually established objectives through collaboration. The North Korean informants were asked to identify US NGOs that fulfill these criteria ("mission-compatible NGOs"). Representatives from all of the mission compatible NGOs were interviewed. All informants provided their perspectives on the factors that contributed to successful programmatic collaborations. The interviews were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed for thematic content. North Korean informants identified six mission-compatible US NGOs. The North Korean and US NGO informants provided a number of factors that contributed to successful programs. These factors were grouped into the following themes: (1) responsiveness to North Korean requests; (2) resident status; (3) program monitoring; (4) sincerity (apolitical objectives); (5) information gathering; and (6) interagency collaboration. Some US NGOs have devised innovative measures to work within a unique set of parameters in North Korea. Both US NGOs and North Korean authorities have made significant concessions to maintain their programmatic partnerships. In this manner, seasoned collaborators have employed creative strategies and a form of health diplomacy to facilitate programmatic success in North Korea by

HMO innovations. Video-enhanced medical advice; senior zoo walkers; Group Health Resource Line; enhancing health education programs through desktop publishing; home health beat; innovative school health partnership.

Science.gov (United States)

Paperny, D M; Maeser, J D; Artz, K; Stroh, M J; Jackson, L; Cohen, K; Lancaster, M S; Heyer, A L; Clevenson, D S

1991-01-01

The editors of HMO PRACTICE asked clinicians and health educators in HMOs across the country to submit reports on their unique, successful patient education programs. The following HMO Innovations testify to the wide range of new technologies, enterprising partnerships, and creative ideas that are shaping health education in HMOs today.

NGO participation in international lawmaking and democratic legitimacy : The debate and its future

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Beijerman, M.

2016-01-01

Over the last few decades, scholars - mainly in the field of law and international relations - have argued that NGOs are indispensable in making international law more democratically legitimate. This study refers to this as the ‘NGO democratic legitimacy thesis’. The thesis is presented as a

The impact of health care professionals' service orientation on patients' innovative behavior.

Science.gov (United States)

Henrike, Hannemann-Weber; Schultz, Carsten

2014-01-01

The increasing availability of medical information and the rising relevance of patient communities drive the active role of health consumers in health care processes. Patients become experts on their disease and provide valuable stimuli for novel care solutions. Medical encounters evolve toward a more collaborative health care service process, where patients are accepted as equal partners. However, the patient's active role depends on the interaction with the involved health care professionals. The aim of this article is to examine whether the service orientation of health care professionals and their proactive and adaptive work behavior and the extent of shared goals within the necessary interdisciplinary health professional team influence patients' innovative behavior. We address six rare diseases and use interview and survey data to test theoretically derived hypotheses. The sample consists of 86 patients and their 160 health care professionals. Sixty patients provided additional information via interviews. Patients' innovative behavior is reflected by the number of generated ideas as well as the variety of ideas. The service orientation of work teams plays an important role in the innovation process of patients. As hypothesized, the extent of shared goals within the health care teams has a direct effect on patients' idea generation. Work adaptivity and proactivity and shared goals both reinforce the positive effect of service orientation. Furthermore, significant associations between the three independent variables and the second outcome variable of patient's idea variety are confirmed. The study underlines (1) the important role of patients within health care service innovation processes, (2) the necessity of a service-oriented working climate to foster the development of innovative care solutions for rare diseases, and (3) the need for an efficient cooperation and open mindset of health care professionals to motivate and support patient innovation.

Integrated versus fragmented implementation of complex innovations in acute health care

Science.gov (United States)

Woiceshyn, Jaana; Blades, Kenneth; Pendharkar, Sachin R.

2017-01-01

Background: Increased demand and escalating costs necessitate innovation in health care. The challenge is to implement complex innovations—those that require coordinated use across the adopting organization to have the intended benefits. Purpose: We wanted to understand why and how two of five similar hospitals associated with the same health care authority made more progress with implementing a complex inpatient discharge innovation whereas the other three experienced more difficulties in doing so. Methodology: We conducted a qualitative comparative case study of the implementation process at five comparable urban hospitals adopting the same inpatient discharge innovation mandated by their health care authority. We analyzed documents and conducted 39 interviews of the health care authority and hospital executives and frontline managers across the five sites over a 1-year period while the implementation was ongoing. Findings: In two and a half years, two of the participating hospitals had made significant progress with implementing the innovation and had begun to realize benefits; they exemplified an integrated implementation mode. Three sites had made minimal progress, following a fragmented implementation mode. In the former mode, a semiautonomous health care organization developed a clear overall purpose and chose one umbrella initiative to implement it. The integrative initiative subsumed the rest and guided resource allocation and the practices of hospital executives, frontline managers, and staff who had bought into it. In contrast, in the fragmented implementation mode, the health care authority had several overlapping, competing innovations that overwhelmed the sites and impeded their implementation. Practice Implications: Implementing a complex innovation across hospital sites required (a) early prioritization of one initiative as integrative, (b) the commitment of additional (traded off or new) human resources, (c) deliberate upfront planning and

The production and use of evidence in health care service innovation: a qualitative study.

Science.gov (United States)

Vasileiou, Konstantina; Barnett, Julie; Young, Terry

2013-03-01

The focus of this article is on a range of concepts of evidence employed by health care innovators in pursuing service innovations and in demonstrating their success. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 18 key informants in the United Kingdom who had won Health Service Journal awards for successfully implementing 15 service innovations. Four concepts of evidence were identified: (a) evidence of effectiveness-both direct and indirect, (b) evidence of efficiency, (c) evidence of innovation acceptance, and (d) evidence of relevance. The results suggest that the innovators articulated evidential concepts from the main approaches prevailing in the British National Health Service, namely clinical trials and improvement cycles. Most aspired to "better" evidence than they were able to obtain, while the approach to evidence gathering was very pragmatic and was more aligned with the improvement-cycle framework. Developing supporting mechanisms for assisting innovation evaluation is an important challenge if service innovation is to be routinely attempted and achieved in health care.

Determinants of innovation within health care organizations: literature review and Delphi study.

Science.gov (United States)

Fleuren, Margot; Wiefferink, Karin; Paulussen, Theo

2004-04-01

When introducing innovations to health care, it is important to gain insight into determinants that may facilitate or impede the introduction, in order to design an appropriate strategy for introducing the innovation. To obtain an overview of determinants of innovations in health care organizations, we carried out a literature review and a Delphi study. The Delphi study was intended to achieve consensus among a group of implementation experts on determinants identified from the literature review. We searched 11 databases for articles published between 1990 and 2000. The keywords varied according to the specific database. We also searched for free text. Forty-four implementation experts (implementation researchers, programme managers, and implementation consultants/advisors) participated in the Delphi study. The following studies were selected: (i) studies describing innovation processes, and determinants thereof, in health care organizations; (ii) studies where the aim of the innovations was to change the behaviour of health professionals; (iii) studies where the health care organizations provided direct patient care; and (iv) studies where only empirical studies were included. Two researchers independently selected the abstracts and analysed the articles. The determinants were divided into four categories: characteristics of the environment, characteristics of the organization, characteristics of the user (health professional), and characteristics of the innovation. When analysing the determinants, a distinction was made between systematically designed and non-systematically designed studies. In a systematic study, a determinant analysis was performed and the innovation strategy was adapted to these determinants. Furthermore, the determinants were associated with the degree of implementation, and both users and non-users of the innovation were asked about possible determinants. In the Delphi study, consensus was defined as agreement among 75% of the experts on

Transforming global health with mobile technologies and social enterprises: global health and innovation conference.

Science.gov (United States)

Kayingo, Gerald

2012-09-01

More than 2,000 people convened for the ninth annual Global Health and Innovation Conference at Yale University on April 21-22, 2012. Participants discussed the latest innovations, ideas in development, lessons learned, opportunities and challenges in global health activities. Several themes emerged, including the important role of frontline workers, strengthening health systems, leveraging social media, and sustainable and impact-driven philanthropy. Overall, the major outcome of the conference was the increased awareness of the potential of mobile technologies and social enterprises in transforming global health. Experts warned that donations and technological advances alone will not transform global health unless there are strong functioning health infrastructures and improved workforce. It was noted that there is a critical need for an integrated systems approach to global health problems and a need for scaling up promising pilot projects. Lack of funding, accountability, and sustainability were identified as major challenges in global health.

Journal of Innovation in Health Informatics: building on the 20-year history of a BCS Health peer review journal

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Simon de Lusignan

2015-02-01

Full Text Available After 20-years as Informatics in Primary Care the journal is renamed Journal of Innovation in Health Informatics. The title was carefully selected to reflect that:(1 informatics provides the opportunity to innovate rather than simply automates;(2 implementing informatics solutions often results in unintended consequences, and many implementations fail and benefits and innovations may go unrecognised;(3 health informatics is a boundary spanning discipline and is by its very nature likely to give rise to innovation.Informatics is an innovative science, and informaticians need to innovate across professional and discipline boundaries.

Collaboration between non-governmental organizations and public services in health – a qualitative case study from rural Ecuador

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Olivia Biermann

2016-11-01

Full Text Available Background: Non-governmental organizations (NGOs have a key role in improving health in low- and middle-income countries. Their work needs to be synergistic, complementary to public services, and rooted in community mobilization and collective action. The study explores how an NGO and its health services are perceived by the population that it serves, and how it can contribute to reducing barriers to care. Design: A qualitative exploratory study was conducted in remote Ecuador, characterized by its widespread poverty and lack of official governance. An international NGO collaborated closely with the public services to deliver preventative and curative health services. Data were collected using focus group discussions and semistructured interviews with purposively sampled community members, healthcare personnel, and community health workers based on their links to the health services. Conventional qualitative content analysis was used, focusing on manifest content. Results: Emerging themes relate to the public private partnership (PPP, the NGO and its services, and community participation. The population perceives the NGO positively, linking it to healthcare improvements. Their priority is to get services, irrespective of the provider's structure. The presence of an NGO in the operation may contribute to unrealistic expectations of health services, affecting perceptions of the latter negatively. Conclusions: To avoid unrealistic expectations and dissatisfaction, and to increase and sustain the population's trust in the organization, an NGO should operate in a manner that is as integrated as possible within the existing structure. The NGO should work close to the population it serves, with services anchored in the community. PPP parties should develop a common platform with joint messages to the target population on the provider's structure, and regarding partners’ roles and responsibilities. Interaction between the population and the providers

Paradoxical health education

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dahl, Kari

Poster presented at International Conference "Communicating for Social Change: Lessons learnt from public health", Glocal NOMAD, Aidsnet (The Danish NGO Network on AIDS and Development), ADRA Denmark and Enreca Health. Copenhagen: Copenhagen University, May 4., 2010,Denmark....

Care Groups I: An Innovative Community-Based Strategy for Improving Maternal, Neonatal, and Child Health in Resource-Constrained Settings.

Science.gov (United States)

Perry, Henry; Morrow, Melanie; Borger, Sarah; Weiss, Jennifer; DeCoster, Mary; Davis, Thomas; Ernst, Pieter

2015-09-01

In view of the slow progress being made in reducing maternal and child mortality in many priority countries, new approaches are urgently needed that can be applied in settings with weak health systems and a scarcity of human resources for health. The Care Group approach uses facilitators, who are a lower-level cadre of paid workers, to work with groups of 12 or so volunteers (the Care Group), and each volunteer is responsible for 10-15 households. The volunteers share messages with the mothers of the households to promote important health behaviors and to use key health services. The Care Groups create a multiplying effect, reaching all households in a community at low cost. This article describes the Care Group approach in more detail, its history, and current NGO experience with implementing the approach across more than 28 countries. A companion article also published in this journal summarizes the evidence on the effectiveness of the Care Group approach. An estimated 1.3 million households—almost entirely in rural areas—have been reached using Care Groups, and at least 106,000 volunteers have been trained. The NGOs with experience implementing Care Groups have achieved high population coverage of key health interventions proven to reduce maternal and child deaths. Some of the essential criteria in applying the Care Group approach include: peer-to-peer health promotion (between mothers), selection of volunteers by mothers, limited workload for the volunteers, limited number of volunteers per Care Group, frequent contact between the volunteers and mothers, use of visual teaching tools and participatory behavior change methods, and regular supervision of volunteers. Incorporating Care Groups into ministries of health would help sustain the approach, which would require creating posts for facilitators as well as supervisors. Although not widely known about outside the NGO child survival and food security networks, the Care Group approach deserves broader

The discursive construction of identity through interaction on social media in a Chinese NGO

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Peverelli, P.J.; Ruelle, O.

2017-01-01

This article investigates the discursive construction of social identity in a Chinese NGO involved in ongoing online discussions on WeChat, China’s fastest growing social networking site. While there is extensive literature on various aspects of online interaction, the analysis of identity

Innovative package for frontline maternal, newborn and child health ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

of Global Health and Human Rights (Department of Emergency Medicine, Massachusetts ... The purpose of MNCS is to build frontline health worker capacity through a training ... This innovative training package may also serve as a model for.

Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa: Strengthening ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

The Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa program aims to assist targeted developing ... The program is part of the Global Health Research Initiative, a collaboration between Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Canada, the ...

Overcoming Barriers in Kidney Health-Forging a Platform for Innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Linde, Peter G; Archdeacon, Patrick; Breyer, Matthew D; Ibrahim, Tod; Inrig, Jula K; Kewalramani, Reshma; Lee, Celeste Castillo; Neuland, Carolyn Y; Roy-Chaudhury, Prabir; Sloand, James A; Meyer, Rachel; Smith, Kimberly A; Snook, Jennifer; West, Melissa; Falk, Ronald J

2016-07-01

Innovation in kidney diseases is not commensurate with the effect of these diseases on human health and mortality or innovation in other key therapeutic areas. A primary cause of the dearth in innovation is that kidney diseases disproportionately affect a demographic that is largely disenfranchised, lacking sufficient advocacy, public attention, and funding. A secondary and likely consequent cause is that the existing infrastructure supporting nephrology research pales in comparison with those for other internal medicine specialties, especially cardiology and oncology. Citing such inequities, however, is not enough. Changing the status quo will require a coordinated effort to identify and redress the existing deficits. Specifically, these deficits relate to the need to further develop and improve the following: understanding of the disease mechanisms and pathophysiology, patient engagement and activism, clinical trial infrastructure, and investigational clinical trial designs as well as coordinated efforts among critical stakeholders. This paper identifies potential solutions to these barriers, some of which are already underway through the Kidney Health Initiative. The Kidney Health Initiative is unique and will serve as a current and future platform from which to overcome these barriers to innovation in nephrology. Copyright © 2016 by the American Society of Nephrology.

Challenges of NGO-to-state Referral in the Delivery of HIV Prevention Programs in Ukraine Supported by the Global Fund

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Svetlana McGill

2016-03-01

Conclusions: Gaps in linking HIV patients to the HIV care continuum have been identified as a potentially problematic issue in delivery of HIV prevention services by GF funded NGOs. With an anticipated GF exit from Ukraine, the lack of clearly defined NGO-to-state referrals of HIV patients complicates the transition of NGO run services into state funding. Further steps to improve referral systems are necessary to ensure a smooth transition and enable Ukraine to fight its HIV epidemic effectively.

Venture funding for science-based African health innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Masum, Hassan; Chakma, Justin; Simiyu, Ken; Ronoh, Wesley; Daar, Abdallah S; Singer, Peter A

2010-12-13

While venture funding has been applied to biotechnology and health in high-income countries, it is still nascent in these fields in developing countries, and particularly in Africa. Yet the need for implementing innovative solutions to health challenges is greatest in Africa, with its enormous burden of communicable disease. Issues such as risk, investment opportunities, return on investment requirements, and quantifying health impact are critical in assessing venture capital's potential for supporting health innovation. This paper uses lessons learned from five venture capital firms from Kenya, South Africa, China, India, and the US to suggest design principles for African health venture funds. The case study method was used to explore relevant funds, and lessons for the African context. The health venture funds in this study included publicly-owned organizations, corporations, social enterprises, and subsidiaries of foreign venture firms. The size and type of investments varied widely. The primary investor in four funds was the International Finance Corporation. Three of the funds aimed primarily for financial returns, one aimed primarily for social and health returns, and one had mixed aims. Lessons learned include the importance of measuring and supporting both social and financial returns; the need to engage both upstream capital such as government risk-funding and downstream capital from the private sector; and the existence of many challenges including difficulty of raising capital, low human resource capacity, regulatory barriers, and risky business environments. Based on these lessons, design principles for appropriate venture funding are suggested. Based on the cases studied and relevant experiences elsewhere, there is a case for venture funding as one support mechanism for science-based African health innovation, with opportunities for risk-tolerant investors to make financial as well as social returns. Such funds should be structured to overcome the

Vaccines, inspiring innovation in health.

Science.gov (United States)

Pagliusi, Sonia; Dennehy, Maureen; Kim, Hun

2018-05-19

This report covers the topics of pandemics, epidemics and partnerships, including regulatory convergence initiatives, new technologies and novel vaccines, discussed by leading public and private sector stakeholders at the 18th Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Developing Countries Vaccine Manufacturers' Network (DCVMN). Contributions of Gavi and the vaccine industry from emerging countries to the growing global vaccine market, by improving the supply base from manufacturers in developing countries and contributing to 58% of doses, were highlighted. The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), the International Vaccine Institute (IVI) and others reported on new strategies to ensure speedy progress in preclinical and clinical development of innovative vaccines for future MERS, Zika or other outbreak response. Priorities for vaccine stockpiling, to assure readiness during emergencies and to prevent outbreaks due to re-emerging diseases such as yellow fever, cholera and poliomyelitis, were outlined. The role of partnerships in improving global vaccine access, procurement and immunization coverage, and shared concerns were reviewed. The World Health Organization (WHO) and other international collaborating partners provided updates on the Product, Price and Procurement database, the prequalification of vaccines, the control of neglected tropical diseases, particularly the new rabies elimination initiative, and regulatory convergence proposals to accelerate vaccine registration in developing countries. Updates on supply chain innovations and novel vaccine platforms were presented. The discussions enabled members and partners to reflect on efficiency of research & development, supply chain tools and trends in packaging technologies improving delivery of existing vaccines, and allowing a deeper understanding of the current public-health objectives, industry financing, and global policies, required to ensure optimal investments, alignment and stability of

Development Innovation Fund for Global Health Research | IDRC ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

The Development Innovation Fund (DIF) will support scientists and scientific institutions ... fundraising and enabling the participation of developing world scientists and ... Mozambique's health sector is dealing with system-wide challenges.

Innovations for Tomorrow: Summary of the 2016 Disaster Health Education Symposium.

Science.gov (United States)

Gulley, Kelly; Strauss-Riggs, Kandra; Kirsch, Thomas D; Goolsby, Craig

2017-04-01

In an effort to enhance education, training, and learning in the disaster health community, the National Center for Disaster Medicine and Public Health (NCDMPH) gathered experts from around the nation in Bethesda, Maryland, on September 8, 2016, for the 2016 Disaster Health Education Symposium: Innovations for Tomorrow. This article summarizes key themes presented during the disaster health symposium including innovations in the following areas: training and education that saves lives, practice, teaching, sharing knowledge, and our communities. This summary article provides thematic content for those unable to attend. Please visit http://ncdmph.usuhs.edu/ for more information. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2017;11:160-162).

Reflecting about gender violence and african american women: The experience of the NGO Maria Mulher - Brazil

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maria Luisa Pereira Oliveira

2008-11-01

Full Text Available The African American women's socioeconomic, political and cultural conditions are unstable; many of these women face social exclusion situations and have no access to public policies. The experience of the NGO Maria Mulher has considered racial discrimination in relation to African American women as a fact which empowers gender violence and causes damage to life quality and to health. This research tried to understand the effects of racial discrimination to the identities construction and to the subjectivation modes of African American women attended by the SOS Racism program. The women showed intense emotional suffering due to discrimination and racism they have faced. In the group process new meanings for the violence were produced, transforming the personal narrative into a public report. 

Service innovations breaking institutionalized rules of health care

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wallin, Arto; Fuglsang, Lars

2017-01-01

.e. regulations, normative rules, and cultural-cognitive beliefs) protecting the field by introducing digitally enabled service innovations into health care markets. Design/methodology/approach – The study is qualitative and interpretative in nature and utilizes case study as a research strategy. The paper...... is based on data that were collected through narrative interviews and document analysis from seven new ventures participating in a start-up accelerator program. Findings – Results indicate that service innovations that require a change in the institutional structures of the health care system are enacted...... through three highly iterative key processes: institutional sensemaking that creates an understanding of prevailing institutional arrangements and that constructs meaning for institutional change efforts, theorization of change through linguistic device, and modifications of institutions by building...

Health care entrepreneurship: financing innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Grazier, Kyle L; Metzler, Bridget

2006-01-01

Entrepreneurship is often described as the ability to create new ventures from new or existing concepts, ideas and visions. There has been significant entrepreneurial response to the changes in the scientific and social underpinnings of health care services delivery. However, a growing portion of the economic development driving health care industry expansion is threatened further by longstanding use of financing models that are suboptimal for health care ventures. The delayed pace of entrepreneurial activity in this industry is in part a response to the general economy and markets, but also due to the lack of capital for new health care ventures. The recent dearth of entrepreneurial activities in the health services sector may also due to failure to consider new approaches to partnerships and strategic ventures, despite their mutually beneficial organizational and financing potential. As capital becomes more scarce for innovators, it is imperative that those with new and creative ideas for health and health care improvement consider techniques for capital acquisition that have been successful in other industries and at similar stages of development. The capital and added expertise can allow entrepreneurs to leverage resources, dampen business fluctuations, and strengthen long term prospects.

Measuring the diffusion of innovative health promotion programs.

Science.gov (United States)

Steckler, A; Goodman, R M; McLeroy, K R; Davis, S; Koch, G

1992-01-01

Once a health promotion program has proven to be effective in one or two initial settings, attempts may be made to transfer the program to new settings. One way to conceptualize the transference of health promotion programs from one locale to another is by considering the programs to be innovations that are being diffused. In this way, diffusion of innovation theory can be applied to guide the process of program transference. This article reports on the development of six questionnaires to measure the extent to which health promotion programs are successfully disseminated: Organizational Climate, Awareness-Concern, Rogers's Adoption Variables, Level of Use, Level of Success, and Level of Institutionalization. The instruments are being successfully used in a study of the diffusion of health promotion/tobacco prevention curricula to junior high schools in North Carolina. The instruments, which measure the four steps of the diffusion process, have construct validity since they were developed within existing theories and are derived from the work of previous researchers. No previous research has attempted to use instruments like these to measure sequentially the stages of the diffusion process.

Building inclusive health innovation systems: lessons from India.

Science.gov (United States)

Abrol, Dinesh; Sundararaman, T; Madhavan, Harilal; Joseph, K J

2016-11-03

This article presents an overview of the changes that are taking place within the public and private health innovation systems in India including delivery of medical care, pharmaceutical products, medical devices, and Indian traditional medicine. The nature of the flaws that exist in the health innovation system is pinpointed. The response by the government, the health, technology and medical institutions, and the evolving industry is addressed on a national level. The article also discusses how the alignment of policies and institutions was developed within the scope of national health innovation systems, and how the government and the industry are dealing with the challenges to integrate health system, industry, and social policy development processes. Resumo: O artigo apresenta um panorama das mudanças atualmente em curso dentro dos sistemas público e privado de inovação em saúde na Índia, incluindo a prestação de serviços médicos, produtos farmacêuticos, dispositivos médicos e medicina tradicional indiana. É destacada a natureza das falhas que existem nos sistemas de inovação em saúde. As respostas do governo, das instituições médicas, de saúde e tecnologia e indústrias envolvidas, são abordadas em nível nacional. O artigo também discute como foi desenvolvido o alinhamento de políticas e instituições no escopo dos sistemas nacionais de inovação em saúde, e como governo e indústria estão lidando com os desafios para integrar o sistema de saúde, a indústria e o desenvolvimento de políticas sociais.

Business-NGO collaboration in a conflict setting: partnership activities in the Democratic Republic of Congo

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kolk, A.; Lenfant, F.

2012-01-01

Although business-NGO (nongovernmental organizations) partnerships have received much attention in recent years, insights have been obtained only from research in "stable" contexts, not from conflict-ridden countries where such collaboration may be even more crucial in building trust and capacity

The Science And Art Of Delivery: Accelerating The Diffusion Of Health Care Innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Parston, Greg; McQueen, Julie; Patel, Hannah; Keown, Oliver P; Fontana, Gianluca; Al Kuwari, Hanan; Al Kuwari, Hannan; Darzi, Ara

2015-12-01

There is a widely acknowledged time lag in health care between an invention or innovation and its widespread use across a health system. Much is known about the factors that can aid the uptake of innovations within discrete organizations. Less is known about what needs to be done to enable innovations to transform large systems of health care. This article describes the results of in-depth case studies aimed at assessing the role of key agents and agencies that facilitate the rapid adoption of innovations. The case studies-from Argentina, England, Nepal, Singapore, Sweden, the United States, and Zambia-represent widely varying health systems and economies. The implications of the findings for policy makers are discussed in terms of key factors within a phased approach for creating a climate for change, engaging and enabling the whole organization, and implementing and sustaining change. Purposeful and directed change management is needed to drive system transformation. Project HOPE—The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.

Innovation contests to promote sexual health in China: a qualitative evaluation.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Wei; Schaffer, David; Tso, Lai Sze; Tang, Songyuan; Tang, Weiming; Huang, Shujie; Yang, Bin; Tucker, Joseph D

2017-01-14

Innovation contests call on non-experts to help solve problems. While these contests have been used extensively in the private sector to increase engagement between organizations and clients, there is little data on the role of innovation contests to promote health campaigns. We implemented an innovation contest in China to increase sexual health awareness among youth and evaluated community engagement in the contest. The sexual health image contest consisted of an open call for sexual health images, contest promotion activities, judging of entries, and celebrating contributions. Contest promotion activities included in-person and social media feedback, classroom didactics, and community-driven activities. We conducted 19 semi-structured interviews with a purposive sample to ensure a range of participant scores, experts and non-expert participants, submitters and non-submitters. Transcripts of each interview were coded with Atlas.ti and evaluated by three reviewers. We identified stages of community engagement in the contest which contributed to public health impact. Community engagement progressed across a continuum from passive, moderate, active, and finally strong engagement. Engagement was a dynamic process that appeared to have little relationship with formally submitting an image to the contest. Among non-expert participants, contest engagement increased knowledge, healthy attitudes, and empowered participants to share ideas about safe sex with others outside of the contest. Among experts who helped organize the contest, the process of implementing the contest fostered multi-sectoral collaboration and re-oriented public health leadership towards more patient-centered public health campaigns. The results of this study suggest that innovation contests may be a useful tool for public health promotion by enhancing community engagement and re-orienting health campaigns to make them more patient-centered.

Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa | IDRC ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

A baby in San Malen Primary Health Unit in Pujehun, Bo district, Sierra Leone ... Children under the age of five in sub-Saharan Africa are also 16 times more likely ... Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa teams share early findings.

"No God and no Norway": collective resource loss among members of Tamil NGO's in Norway during and after the last phase of the civil war in Sri Lanka.

Science.gov (United States)

Guribye, Eugene

2011-08-17

Studies on the mental health of refugees have tended to focus upon the impact of traumatic experiences in the country of origin, and acculturation processes in exile. The effects of crises in the country of origin on refugees living in exile have been little studied. This article examines how the final stages of the civil war in Sri Lanka in 2009 influenced members of pro-LTTE Tamil NGO's in Norway. Ethnographic fieldwork methods were employed within Tamil NGO's in the two largest cities in Norway between November 2008 and June 2011. The findings suggest that collective resources became severely drained as a result of the crisis, severely disrupting the fabric of social life. Public support from the majority community remained scarce throughout the crisis. The study suggests that there is a need for public support to exile groups indirectly affected by man-made crises in their country of origin.

Business-NGO Collaboration in a Conflict Setting: Partnership Activities in the Democratic Republic of Congo

NARCIS (Netherlands)

A. Kolk (Ans); F. Lenfant (François)

2012-01-01

textabstractWhile business-NGO partnerships have received much attention in recent years, insights have been obtained from research in ‘stable’ contexts, not from conflict-ridden countries where such collaboration may be even more crucial in building trust and capacity and in addressing

Analysis of pan-African Centres of excellence in health innovation highlights opportunities and challenges for local innovation and financing in the continent

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Nwaka Solomon

2012-07-01

Full Text Available Abstract A pool of 38 pan-African Centres of Excellence (CoEs in health innovation has been selected and recognized by the African Network for Drugs and Diagnostics Innovation (ANDI, through a competitive criteria based process. The process identified a number of opportunities and challenges for health R&D and innovation in the continent: i it provides a direct evidence for the existence of innovation capability that can be leveraged to fill specific gaps in the continent; ii it revealed a research and financing pattern that is largely fragmented and uncoordinated, and iii it highlights the most frequent funders of health research in the continent. The CoEs are envisioned as an innovative network of public and private institutions with a critical mass of expertise and resources to support projects and a variety of activities for capacity building and scientific exchange, including hosting fellows, trainees, scientists on sabbaticals and exchange with other African and non-African institutions.

Innovation and technology transfer in the health sciences: a cross-sectional perspective.

Science.gov (United States)

Blanch, L; Guerra, L; Lanuza, A; Palomar, G

2014-11-01

This article is based on the strategic reflection and discussion that took place on occasion of the first conference on innovation and technology transfer in the health sciences organized by the REGIC-ENS-FENIN-SEMICYUC and held in Madrid in the Instituto de Salud Carlos III on May 7th, 2013, with the aim of promoting the transfer of technological innovation in medicine and health care beyond the European program "Horizon 2020". The presentations dealt with key issues such as evaluation of the use of new technologies, the need to impregnate the decisions related to adoption and innovation with the concepts of value and sustainability, and the implication of knowledge networks in the need to strengthen their influence upon the creation of a "culture of innovation" among health professionals. But above all, emphasis was placed on the latent innovation potential of hospitals, and the fact that these, being the large companies that they are, should seriously consider that much of their future sustainability may depend on proper management of their ability to generate innovation, which is not only the generation of ideas but also their transformation into products or processes that create value and economic returns. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier España, S.L.U. and SEMICYUC. All rights reserved.

Science-based health innovation in Tanzania: bednets and a base for invention.

Science.gov (United States)

Shah, Ronak; Singer, Peter A; Daar, Abdallah S

2010-12-13

Tanzania is East Africa's largest country. Although it is socially diverse, it has experienced general political stability since independence in 1964. Despite gradual economic development and Tanzania's status as one of the biggest recipients of aid in Africa, health status remains poor. This paper explores Tanzania's science-based health innovation system, and highlights areas which can be strengthened. Qualitative case study research methodology was used. Data were collected through reviews of academic literature and policy documents, and through open-ended, face-to-face interviews with 52 people from across the science-based health innovation system over two visits to Tanzania from July to October 2007. Tanzania has a rich but complex S&T governance landscape, with the public sector driving the innovation agenda through a series of different bodies which are not well-coordinated. It has some of the leading health research on the continent at the University of Dar es Salaam, Muhimbili University of Health and Applied Sciences, the National Institute for Medical Research and the Ifakara Medical Institute, with strong donor support. Tanzania has found developing an entrepreneurial culture difficult; nevertheless projects such as the clusters initiative at the University of Dar es Salaam are encouraging low-tech innovation and overcoming knowledge-sharing barriers. In the private sector, one generics company has developed a South-South collaboration to enable technology transfer and hence the local production of anti-retrovirals. Local textile company A to Z Textiles is now manufacturing 30 million insecticide impregnated bednets a year. To have a coherent vision for innovation, Tanzania may wish to address some key issues: coordination across stakeholders involved with health research, increasing graduates in health-related disciplines, and building capabilities in biological testing, preclinical testing, formulation and standardization, and related areas important

Increasing the occupational therapy mental health workforce through innovative practice education: a pilot project.

Science.gov (United States)

Rodger, Sylvia; Thomas, Yvonne; Holley, Sue; Springfield, Elizabeth; Edwards, Ann; Broadbridge, Jacqui; Greber, Craig; McBryde, Cathy; Banks, Rebecca; Hawkins, Rachel

2009-12-01

This paper describes the evaluation of a pilot trial of two innovative placement models in the area of mental health, namely role emerging and collaborative supervision. The Queensland Occupational Therapy Fieldwork Collaborative conducted this trial in response to workforce shortages in mental health. Six occupational therapy students and eight practice educators were surveyed pre- and post-placements regarding implementation of these innovative models. Students participating in these placements reported that they were highly likely to work in mental health upon graduation, and practice educators were positive about undertaking innovative placements in future. An overview of the placement sites, trials, outcomes and limitations of this pilot trial is provided. Though limited by its small sample size, this pilot trial has demonstrated the potential of innovative placement models to provide valuable student learning experiences in mental health. The profession needs to develop expertise in the use of innovative placement models if students are to be adequately prepared to work with the mental health issues of the Australian community now and in the future.

Does contracting of health care in Afghanistan work? Public and service-users' perceptions and experience.

Science.gov (United States)

Cockcroft, Anne; Khan, Amir; Md Ansari, Noor; Omer, Khalid; Hamel, Candyce; Andersson, Neil

2011-12-21

In rebuilding devastated health services, the government of Afghanistan has provided access to basic services mainly by contracting with non-government organisations (NGOs), and more recently the Strengthening Mechanism (SM) of contracting with Provincial Health Offices. Community-based information about the public's views and experience of health services is scarce. Field teams visited households in a stratified random sample of 30 communities in two districts in Kabul province, with health services mainly provided either by an NGO or through the SM and administered a questionnaire about household views, use, and experience of health services, including payments for services and corruption. They later discussed the findings with separate community focus groups of men and women. We calculated weighted frequencies of views and experience of services and multivariate analysis examined the related factors. The survey covered 3283 households including 2845 recent health service users. Some 42% of households in the SM district and 57% in the NGO district rated available health services as good. Some 63% of households in the SM district (adjacent to Kabul) and 93% in the NGO district ordinarily used government health facilities. Service users rated private facilities more positively than government facilities. Government service users were more satisfied in urban facilities, if the household head was not educated, if they had enough food in the last week, and if they waited less than 30 minutes. Many households were unwilling to comment on corruption in health services; 15% in the SM district and 26% in the NGO district reported having been asked for an unofficial payment. Despite a policy of free services, one in seven users paid for treatment in government facilities, and three in four paid for medicine outside the facilities. Focus groups confirmed people knew payments were unofficial; they were afraid to talk about corruption. Households used government health

Does contracting of health care in Afghanistan work? Public and service-users' perceptions and experience

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cockcroft Anne

2011-12-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background In rebuilding devastated health services, the government of Afghanistan has provided access to basic services mainly by contracting with non-government organisations (NGOs, and more recently the Strengthening Mechanism (SM of contracting with Provincial Health Offices. Community-based information about the public's views and experience of health services is scarce. Methods Field teams visited households in a stratified random sample of 30 communities in two districts in Kabul province, with health services mainly provided either by an NGO or through the SM and administered a questionnaire about household views, use, and experience of health services, including payments for services and corruption. They later discussed the findings with separate community focus groups of men and women. We calculated weighted frequencies of views and experience of services and multivariate analysis examined the related factors. Results The survey covered 3283 households including 2845 recent health service users. Some 42% of households in the SM district and 57% in the NGO district rated available health services as good. Some 63% of households in the SM district (adjacent to Kabul and 93% in the NGO district ordinarily used government health facilities. Service users rated private facilities more positively than government facilities. Government service users were more satisfied in urban facilities, if the household head was not educated, if they had enough food in the last week, and if they waited less than 30 minutes. Many households were unwilling to comment on corruption in health services; 15% in the SM district and 26% in the NGO district reported having been asked for an unofficial payment. Despite a policy of free services, one in seven users paid for treatment in government facilities, and three in four paid for medicine outside the facilities. Focus groups confirmed people knew payments were unofficial; they were afraid to talk about

Innovation contests to promote sexual health in china: a qualitative evaluation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wei Zhang

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Innovation contests call on non-experts to help solve problems. While these contests have been used extensively in the private sector to increase engagement between organizations and clients, there is little data on the role of innovation contests to promote health campaigns. We implemented an innovation contest in China to increase sexual health awareness among youth and evaluated community engagement in the contest. Methods The sexual health image contest consisted of an open call for sexual health images, contest promotion activities, judging of entries, and celebrating contributions. Contest promotion activities included in-person and social media feedback, classroom didactics, and community-driven activities. We conducted 19 semi-structured interviews with a purposive sample to ensure a range of participant scores, experts and non-expert participants, submitters and non-submitters. Transcripts of each interview were coded with Atlas.ti and evaluated by three reviewers. Results We identified stages of community engagement in the contest which contributed to public health impact. Community engagement progressed across a continuum from passive, moderate, active, and finally strong engagement. Engagement was a dynamic process that appeared to have little relationship with formally submitting an image to the contest. Among non-expert participants, contest engagement increased knowledge, healthy attitudes, and empowered participants to share ideas about safe sex with others outside of the contest. Among experts who helped organize the contest, the process of implementing the contest fostered multi-sectoral collaboration and re-oriented public health leadership towards more patient-centered public health campaigns. Conclusion The results of this study suggest that innovation contests may be a useful tool for public health promotion by enhancing community engagement and re-orienting health campaigns to make them more patient-centered.

Where Are the NGOs and Why? The Distribution of Health and Development NGOs in Bolivia

OpenAIRE

Galway, Lindsay P.; Corbett, Kitty K.; Zeng, Leilei

2012-01-01

Abstract Background The presence and influence of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the landscape of global health and development have dramatically increased over the past several decades. The distribution of NGO activity and the ways in which contextual factors influence the distribution of NGO activity across geographies merit study. This paper explores the distribution of NGO activity, using Bolivia as a case study, and identifies local factors that are related to the distribution o...

Venture funding for science-based African health innovation

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Daar Abdallah S

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background While venture funding has been applied to biotechnology and health in high-income countries, it is still nascent in these fields in developing countries, and particularly in Africa. Yet the need for implementing innovative solutions to health challenges is greatest in Africa, with its enormous burden of communicable disease. Issues such as risk, investment opportunities, return on investment requirements, and quantifying health impact are critical in assessing venture capital’s potential for supporting health innovation. This paper uses lessons learned from five venture capital firms from Kenya, South Africa, China, India, and the US to suggest design principles for African health venture funds. Discussion The case study method was used to explore relevant funds, and lessons for the African context. The health venture funds in this study included publicly-owned organizations, corporations, social enterprises, and subsidiaries of foreign venture firms. The size and type of investments varied widely. The primary investor in four funds was the International Finance Corporation. Three of the funds aimed primarily for financial returns, one aimed primarily for social and health returns, and one had mixed aims. Lessons learned include the importance of measuring and supporting both social and financial returns; the need to engage both upstream capital such as government risk-funding and downstream capital from the private sector; and the existence of many challenges including difficulty of raising capital, low human resource capacity, regulatory barriers, and risky business environments. Based on these lessons, design principles for appropriate venture funding are suggested. Summary Based on the cases studied and relevant experiences elsewhere, there is a case for venture funding as one support mechanism for science-based African health innovation, with opportunities for risk-tolerant investors to make financial as well as social

ANALISIS SOUND GOVERNANCE: SIKAP PEMERINTAH DAERAH TERHADAP KETERLIBATAN NGO DALAM PEMBERDAYAAN MASYARAKAT PESISIR

OpenAIRE

Safitri, Dian Prima; Edison, Edison; Kurniasih, Fitri

2018-01-01

Penelitian ini mengkaji persoalan respond pemerintah daerah khususnya terkait sikap pemerintah dalam dimensi Sound Governance terhadap Non Government Organization (NGO) yang sangat aktif melakukan pemberdayaan masyarakat pesisir. Kegiatan pemberdayan tersebut dilakukan di Kabupaten Bintan Kepulauan Riau (Kepri). Setting penelitian ini di lokasi Kampung Wisata Panglong di Desa Berakit Kabupaten Bintan. Penelitian ini menerapkan jenis penelitian deskriptif dengan pendekatan kualitatif. Data dip...

Human Trafficking and Education: A Qualitative Case Study of Two NGO Programs in Thailand

Science.gov (United States)

Spires, Robert Weber

2012-01-01

In this qualitative, ethnographic case study, I examine two Thai NGO shelters/schools working with human trafficking survivors and at-risk populations of children ages 5-18. The two NGOs had a residential component, meaning that children live at the shelter, and an educational component, meaning that children are taught academic and vocational…

Robots and service innovation in health care.

Science.gov (United States)

Oborn, Eivor; Barrett, Michael; Darzi, Ara

2011-01-01

Robots have long captured our imagination and are being used increasingly in health care. In this paper we summarize, organize and criticize the health care robotics literature and highlight how the social and technical elements of robots iteratively influence and redefine each other. We suggest the need for increased emphasis on sociological dimensions of using robots, recognizing how social and work relations are restructured during changes in practice. Further, we propose the usefulness of a 'service logic' in providing insight as to how robots can influence health care innovation. The Royal Society of Medicine Press Ltd 2011.

NGO Partnerships in Using Ecotourism for Conservation: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tania P Romero-Brito

Full Text Available We analyse 214 cases worldwide where non-governmental organisations (NGOs use ecotourism for conservation. Other stakeholders in these initiatives include local communities, the private sector, and government agencies. Stakeholder relationships determine NGO roles and project management structures and governance. We classified cases into 10 structural categories based on the initiating stakeholder and the NGO role, and used these categories to analyze geographic patterns and success factors. Most of the 214 cases are community-based (~170; 79%; most are in developing countries (190; 89%; and most are in protected areas (196; 91%. Frequencies of structural categories differ between continents. More cases in Latin America and Asia are initiated by NGOs and local communities, and more in Africa by the private sector. Case-study authors used a range of economic, socio-cultural and environmental criteria to judge whether projects were successful. At global scale, we found no significant association between project success and the involvement of private tourism entrepreneurs. Projects involving either local or international NGOs had higher success rates than those that involved both simultaneously. Future research could adopt political ecology approaches to examine: the factors that lead NGOs to adopt ecotourism enterprises; their internal decision-making processes and strategies; their interactions with the stakeholders involved; and their conservation goals and outcomes.

NGO Partnerships in Using Ecotourism for Conservation: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Romero-Brito, Tania P; Buckley, Ralf C; Byrne, Jason

2016-01-01

We analyse 214 cases worldwide where non-governmental organisations (NGOs) use ecotourism for conservation. Other stakeholders in these initiatives include local communities, the private sector, and government agencies. Stakeholder relationships determine NGO roles and project management structures and governance. We classified cases into 10 structural categories based on the initiating stakeholder and the NGO role, and used these categories to analyze geographic patterns and success factors. Most of the 214 cases are community-based (~170; 79%); most are in developing countries (190; 89%); and most are in protected areas (196; 91%). Frequencies of structural categories differ between continents. More cases in Latin America and Asia are initiated by NGOs and local communities, and more in Africa by the private sector. Case-study authors used a range of economic, socio-cultural and environmental criteria to judge whether projects were successful. At global scale, we found no significant association between project success and the involvement of private tourism entrepreneurs. Projects involving either local or international NGOs had higher success rates than those that involved both simultaneously. Future research could adopt political ecology approaches to examine: the factors that lead NGOs to adopt ecotourism enterprises; their internal decision-making processes and strategies; their interactions with the stakeholders involved; and their conservation goals and outcomes.

NASA Human Health and Performance Center: Open Innovation Successes and Collaborative Projects

Science.gov (United States)

Davis, Jeffrey R.; Richard, Elizabeth E.

2014-01-01

In May 2007, what was then the Space Life Sciences Directorate published the 2007 Space Life Sciences Strategy for Human Space Exploration, which resulted in the development and implementation of new business models and significant advances in external collaboration over the next five years. The strategy was updated on the basis of these accomplishments and reissued as the NASA Human Health and Performance Strategy in 2012, and continues to drive new approaches to innovation for the directorate. This short paper describes the open innovation successes and collaborative projects developed over this timeframe, including the efforts of the NASA Human Health and Performance Center (NHHPC), which was established to advance human health and performance innovations for spaceflight and societal benefit via collaboration in new markets.

Health technology assessment, value-based decision making, and innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Henshall, Chris; Schuller, Tara

2013-10-01

Identifying treatments that offer value and value for money is becoming increasingly important, with interest in how health technology assessment (HTA) and decision makers can take appropriate account of what is of value to patients and to society, and in the relationship between innovation and assessments of value. This study summarizes points from an Health Technology Assessment International (HTAi) Policy Forum discussion, drawing on presentations, discussions among attendees, and background papers. Various perspectives on value were considered; most place patient health at the core of value. Wider elements of value comprise other benefits for: patients; caregivers; the health and social care systems; and society. Most decision-making systems seek to take account of similar elements of value, although they are assessed and combined in different ways. Judgment in decisions remains important and cannot be replaced by mathematical approaches. There was discussion of the value of innovation and of the effects of value assessments on innovation. Discussion also included moving toward "progressive health system decision making," an ongoing process whereby evidence-based decisions on use would be made at various stages in the technology lifecycle. Five actions are identified: (i) development of a general framework for the definition and assessment of value; development by HTA/coverage bodies and regulators of (ii) disease-specific guidance and (iii) further joint scientific advice for industry on demonstrating value; (iv) development of a framework for progressive licensing, usage, and reimbursement; and (v) promoting work to better adapt HTA, coverage, and procurement approaches to medical devices.

Introducing operations research into management and policy practices of a non-governmental organization (NGO): a partnership between an Indian leprosy NGO and an international academic institution.

Science.gov (United States)

Porter, J D H; Ogden, J A; Rao, P V Ranganadha; Rao, V Prabhakar; Rajesh, D; Buskade, R A; Soutar, D

2004-03-01

This paper reports on a partnership between LEPRA, a non-governmental organization (NGO), and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) to explore the feasibility and appropriateness of incorporating operations research into the management and decision-making of a leprosy NGO. A pilot study in Orissa was used to determine the advantages and disadvantages of introducing operations research to assist in decision-making and programme implementation within the organization. The results highlight the difficulty and complexity of the process, but point to several important themes: partnership, changing perspectives, use of time and priority-setting, identification of gaps in systems, and building institutional and personal capabilities. The results of the study provide support to encourage NGOs to become actively involved in research. Because of their work and service to local communities, NGOs have the opportunity to collect information about the perceptions, resources and constraints of individuals, families and the communities themselves in accessing appropriate care. Their proximity to communities gives them a feeling of responsibility for ensuring that this information is translated to the district, national and ultimately international level. This will help to ensure the creation of appropriate infectious disease control policies that support the needs of patients. 'Outside' academic institutions can help NGOs to facilitate this up-stream flow of information from the local to the national and international level, to help to ensure that international disease control policies are appropriately serving local communities.

Technological innovation and its effect on public health in the United States

Science.gov (United States)

Gill, Preetinder Singh

2013-01-01

Background Good public health ensures an efficient work force. Organizations can ensure a prominent position on the global stage by staying on the leading edge of technological development. Public health and technological innovation are vital elements of prosperous economies. It is important to understand how these elements affect each other. This research study explored and described the relationship between these two critical elements/constructs. Methods Indicators representing technological innovation and public health were identified. Indicator data from 2000 to 2009 were collected from various US federal government sources, for the four US Census regions. The four US Census regions were then compared in terms of these indicators. Canonical correlation equations were formulated to identify combinations of the indicators that are strongly related to each other. Additionally, the cause–effect relationship between public health and technological innovation was described using the structural equation modeling technique. Results The four US Census regions ranked differently in terms of both type of indicators in a statistically significant manner. The canonical correlation analysis showed that the first set of canonical variables had a fairly strong relationship, with a magnitude > 0.65 at the 95% confidence interval, for all census regions. Structural equation modeling analysis provided β 12.98, for all census regions. The threshold Student’s t statistic was 1.98. Hence, it was found that the β values were significant at the 95% confidence interval, for all census regions. Discussion The results of the study showed that better technological innovation indicator scores were associated with better public health indicator scores. Furthermore, the study provided preliminary evidence that technological innovation shares causal relation with public health. PMID:23378771

Innovative Approaches to Task Shifting in Mental Health | CRDI ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

Innovative Approaches to Task Shifting in Mental Health. Across the world, it is estimated that mental disorders account for 12% of disability-adjusted life years. This proportion is still increasing and projected to reach 15% by 2020. However, provision of mental health services has not matched the need, especially in ...

Local sustainability and scaling up for user fee exemptions: medical NGOs vis-à-vis health systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Olivier de Sardan, Jean-Pierre; Diarra, Aïssa; Koné, Félix Yaouaga; Yaogo, Maurice; Zerbo, Roger

2015-01-01

Free healthcare obviously works when a partner from abroad supplies a health centre or a health district with medicines and funding on a regular basis, provides medical, administrative and managerial training, and gives incentive bonuses and daily subsistence allowances to staff. The experiments by three international NGO in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger have all been success stories. But withdrawing NGO support means that health centres that have enjoyed a time of plenty under NGO management will return to the fold of health centres run by the state in its present condition and the health system in its present condition, with the everyday consequences of late reimbursements and stock shortages. The local support given by international NGOs has more often than not an effect of triggering an addiction to aid instead of inducing local sustainability without infusion. In the same way, scaling up to the entire country a local pilot experiment conducted under an NGO involves its insertion into a national bureaucratic machine with its multiple levels, all of which are potential bottlenecks. Only experiments carried out under the "ordinary" management of the state are capable of laying bare the problems associated with this process. Without reformers 'on the inside' (within the health system itself and among health workers), no real reform of the health system induced by reformers 'from the outside' can succeed.

Health, Work Intensity, and Technological Innovations

OpenAIRE

Raouf Boucekkine; Natali Hritonenko; Yuri Yatsenko

2013-01-01

Work significantly affects human life and health. Overworking may decrease the quality of life and cause direct economic losses. Technological innovations encourage modernization of firms' capital and improve labor productivity in the workplace. The paper investigates the optimal individual choice of work intensity under improving technology embodied in new equipment leading to shorter lifetime of capital goods (obsolescence). The balanced growth trajectories are analyzed in this context to f...

"No God and no Norway": collective resource loss among members of Tamil NGO's in Norway during and after the last phase of the civil war in Sri Lanka

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Guribye Eugene

2011-08-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Studies on the mental health of refugees have tended to focus upon the impact of traumatic experiences in the country of origin, and acculturation processes in exile. The effects of crises in the country of origin on refugees living in exile have been little studied. This article examines how the final stages of the civil war in Sri Lanka in 2009 influenced members of pro-LTTE Tamil NGO's in Norway. Method Ethnographic fieldwork methods were employed within Tamil NGO's in the two largest cities in Norway between November 2008 and June 2011. Results The findings suggest that collective resources became severely drained as a result of the crisis, severely disrupting the fabric of social life. Public support from the majority community remained scarce throughout the crisis. Conclusions The study suggests that there is a need for public support to exile groups indirectly affected by man-made crises in their country of origin.

Science-based health innovation in Tanzania: bednets and a base for invention

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Daar Abdallah S

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Tanzania is East Africa’s largest country. Although it is socially diverse, it has experienced general political stability since independence in 1964. Despite gradual economic development and Tanzania’s status as one of the biggest recipients of aid in Africa, health status remains poor. This paper explores Tanzania’s science-based health innovation system, and highlights areas which can be strengthened. Methods Qualitative case study research methodology was used. Data were collected through reviews of academic literature and policy documents, and through open-ended, face-to-face interviews with 52 people from across the science-based health innovation system over two visits to Tanzania from July to October 2007. Results and discussion Tanzania has a rich but complex S&T governance landscape, with the public sector driving the innovation agenda through a series of different bodies which are not well-coordinated. It has some of the leading health research on the continent at the University of Dar es Salaam, Muhimbili University of Health and Applied Sciences, the National Institute for Medical Research and the Ifakara Medical Institute, with strong donor support. Tanzania has found developing an entrepreneurial culture difficult; nevertheless projects such as the clusters initiative at the University of Dar es Salaam are encouraging low-tech innovation and overcoming knowledge-sharing barriers. In the private sector, one generics company has developed a South-South collaboration to enable technology transfer and hence the local production of anti-retrovirals. Local textile company A to Z Textiles is now manufacturing 30 million insecticide impregnated bednets a year. Conclusions To have a coherent vision for innovation, Tanzania may wish to address some key issues: coordination across stakeholders involved with health research, increasing graduates in health-related disciplines, and building capabilities in biological

User Participation in Coproduction of Health Innovation: Proposal for a Synergy Project.

Science.gov (United States)

Nygren, Jens; Zukauskaite, Elena; Westberg, Niklas

2018-05-09

This project concerns advancing knowledge, methods, and logic for user participation in coproduction of health innovations. Such advancement is vital for several reasons. From a user perspective, participation in coproduction provides an opportunity to gain real influence over goal definition, design, and implementation of health innovations, ensuring that the solution developed solves real problems in right ways. From a societal perspective, it's a mean to improve the efficiency of health care and the implementation of the Patient Act. As for industry, frameworks and knowledge of coproduction offer tools to operate in a complex sector, with great potential for innovation of services and products. The fundamental objective of this project is to advance knowledge and methods of how user participation in the coproduction of health innovations can be applied in order to benefit users, industry, and public sector. This project is a synergy project, which means that the objective will be accomplished through collaboration and meta-analysis between three subprojects that address different user groups, apply different strategies to promote human health, and relate to different parts of the health sector. Furthermore, subprojects focus on distinctive stages in the spectrum of innovation, with the objective to generate knowledge of the innovation process as a whole. The project is organized around three work packages related to three challenges-coproduction, positioning, and realization. Each subproject is designed such that it has its own field of study with clearly identified objectives but also targets work packages to contribute to the project as a whole. The work on the work packages will use case methodology for data collection and analysis based on the subprojects as data sources. More concretely, logic of multiple case studies will be applied with each subproject representing a separate case which is similar to each other in its attention to user participation in

Intensifying Innovation Adoption in Educational eHealth

Science.gov (United States)

Rissanen, M. K.

2014-01-01

In demanding innovation areas such as eHealth, the primary emphasis is easily placed on the product and process quality aspects in the design phase. Customer quality may receive adequate attention when the target audience is well-defined. But if the multidimensional evaluative focus does not get enough space until the implementation phase, this…

Innovative financing for health: what are the options for South Africa?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Robert J. Fryatt

2012-10-01

Full Text Available The paper assesses the options for additional innovative financing that could be considered in South Africa, covering both raising new funds and linking funds to results. New funds could come from: i the private sector, including the mining and mobile phone industry; ii from voluntary sources, through charities and foundations; iii and through further expanding health (sin levies on products such as tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food and drinks. As in other countries, South Africa could earmark some of these additional sources for investment in interventions and research to reduce unhealthy behaviors and influence the determinants of health. South Africa could also expand innovative linking of funds to improve overall performance of the health sector, including mitigating the risks for non-state investment and exploring different forms of financial incentives for providers and patients. All such innovations would require rigorous monitoring and evaluation to assess whether intended benefits are achieved and to look for unintended consequences.

Challenges of stimulating a market for social innovation - provision of a national health account.

Science.gov (United States)

Wass, Sofie; Vimarlund, Vivian

2015-01-01

Innovation in healthcare can be associated with social innovation and the mission to contribute to a shared value that benefits not only individuals or organizations but the society as a whole. In this paper, we present the prerequisites of stimulating a market for social innovations by studying the introduction of a national health account. The results show that there is a need to clarify if a national health account should be viewed as a public good or not, to clarify the financial responsibilities of different actors, to establish clear guidelines and to develop regulations concerning price, quality and certification of actors. The ambition to stimulate the market through a national health account is a promising start. However, the challenges have to be confronted in order for public and private actors to collaborate and build a market for social innovations such as a national health account.

The impact of innovation funding on a rural health nursing service: the Reporoa experience.

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Connor, Margaret; Nelson, Katherine; Maisey, Jane

2009-07-01

Health Reporoa Inc. offers a first contact rural nursing service to the village of Reporoa and surrounding districts. From 2003 to 2006 it became a project site through selection for the Ministry of Health (MoH) primary health care nursing innovation funding. Health Reporoa Inc. successfully achieved its project goals and gained an ongoing contract from Lakes District Health Board to consolidate and further expand its services at the close of the funding period. This paper examines the impact of the innovation funding during the project period and in the two years that followed. The major impact came through an expansion of the accessible free health service to the local population; advancing nursing practice; increased connection to the nursing profession and wider health community, and enhanced affirmation of the nursing contribution. The rural nursing service model developed at Health Reporoa, through the benefit of innovation funding, can now act as a blueprint for other rural health services, particularly those in high deprivation areas.

Commentary: Teaching creativity and innovative thinking in medicine and the health sciences.

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Ness, Roberta B

2011-10-01

The National Academies of Science recently criticized the state of scientific innovation and competitiveness in the United States. Evaluations of already-established creativity training programs--examining a broad array of students, from school age to adult and with a wide range of abilities--have shown that such courses improve thinking skills, attitudes, and performance. Although academic medicine provides informal training in creativity and innovation, it has yet to incorporate formal instruction on these topics into medical education. A number of existing, thoughtfully constructed and evaluated creativity programs in other fields provide a pedagogical basis for developing creativity training programs for the health sciences. The content of creativity training programs typically includes instruction and application in (1) divergent thinking, (2) problem solving, and (3) creative production. Instructional formats that have been shown to elicit the best outcomes are an admixture of lectures, discussion, and guided practice. A pilot program to teach innovative thinking to health science students at the University of Texas includes instruction in recognizing and finding alternatives to frames or habitual cognitive patterns, in addition to the constructs already mentioned. As innovation is the engine of scientific progress, the author, founder of Innovative Thinking, the creativity training pilot program at the University of Texas, argues in this commentary that academic health centers should implement and evaluate new methods for enhancing science students' innovative thinking to keep the United States as a worldwide leader in scientific discovery.

Social perceptions about a technological innovation for fuelwood cooking: Case study in rural Mexico

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Troncoso, Karin; Castillo, Alicia; Masera, Omar; Merino, Leticia

2007-01-01

The widespread use of traditional biomass fuels in open fires in developing countries brings about serious health effects, besides high fuelwood consumption. A technological innovation-i.e., improved cookstoves-reduce fuel consumption and address the health effects of indoor air pollution. Implementation projects have been conducted worldwide, but have frequently faced very low success rates. Different demographic and socio-economic factors have been analysed to explain low rates but there are almost no studies that try to understand, from the users' perspective, the factors involved when choosing among different cooking technologies. Through a qualitative methodological approach we documented the adoption of improved cookstoves through the implementation programme of a Mexican NGO. Results showed that although the programme raised public awareness, the improved cookstoves did not reach the poorest sector. The socioeconomic level was found positively correlated with the adoption of the improved cookstoves, but neither the age nor the educational levels were. Payment of the stove did not seem to be an adoption factor. Differences among individual users were more significant than differences between communities. Finally as men are the principal fuelwood harvesters, they should be considered as an important group in diffusion programs

Internet-driven changes in environmental NGO action

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Pedro Pereira Neto

2008-12-01

Full Text Available Information and Communication Technologies, considered both as a technological resource and as a social technology, play an important role in the shaping of existing social relations and in the creation of new modes of interaction and social organization (AA. VV., 2000. However, traditional approaches of political action frequently misstate just how politically active citizens are by underrating changes occurred in the realm of political mediation (Norris, 2002, p. 2; Epstein, 1991, p. 230. The changes in the organizational and action repertoires go hand in hand with the specificities of each NGO's cultural interpretative devices, which are influenced by technological change (Zald, 1996, p. 266-270. On the other hand, frames are also subject to internal debate, a process in which ICTs also take part (Webster, 2001, p. 7. Hence, this paper focuses on clarifying the ways in which NGOs have their structure and action repertoires changed by the use of ICTs.

African Security Challenges: Now and Over the Horizon - Voices from the NGO Community

Science.gov (United States)

2010-11-01

economies will have a tendency to shift back to dependence on unskilled sectors such as mining, black -market or informal trading and international aid...PEPFAR Watch. Pepfarwatch.org. Rice , A. 2007. “An African Solution.” Nation, June 11. Voices from the NGO Community - 5.19 - African Security...oversight role in this area by parliaments, regardless of formal mandates, roles and responsibilities. In order to avoid the risk of cosmetic changes

Oral histories of HIV/AIDS support group members, NGO workers and home-based carers in KwaZulu-Natal.

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Denis, Philippe

2016-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to bring to the attention of the AIDS research community the existence of an oral history project known as the Memories of AIDS Project. The project focused on HIV/AIDS support group members, non-governmental organisation (NGO) workers and home-based carers in the Umgungundlovu (Pietermaritzburg) District Municipality, South Africa. The project was carried out by the Sinomlando Centre for Oral History and Memory Work, a research and community development centre of the University of KwaZulu-Natal, over a period of three years (2011-2013). Sixty-five individual oral history interviews of 1 to 4 hours duration and 11 focus group sessions were recorded, transcribed and translated from isiZulu into English when necessary. The life stories of community workers and support group members documented in the interviews show, on the part of the informants, a remarkable degree of agency and assertiveness in matters of sexuality, gender relations and religious beliefs. They found innovative ways of navigating through the conflicting claims of biomedicine, Christianity and African traditional religion. As much as the epidemic caused grief and suffering, it opened the door to new knowledge and new opportunities.

Effects of office innovation on office workers' health and performance

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Meijer, Eline M.; Frings-Dresen, Monique H. W.; Sluiter, Judith K.

2009-01-01

The implementation of an innovative office concept (e.g. open-plan, flexible workplaces and a paperless office concept) on health and productivity among office workers was evaluated with questionnaires of 138 workers at baseline and 6 and 15 months afterwards. Work-related fatigue, general health,

Concerning Support for SME’s as Suppliers of Public Health Tech Innovation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rolfstam, Max

be ameliorated by developing public procurement of innovation policies specifically targeting SME promotion. Research limitations/implications The analysis of the literature remains on aggregate levels. The included firms worked with health tech innovation. Originality/value Unlike many studies and policy...

Science-based health innovation in Uganda: creative strategies for applying research to development

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Daar Abdallah S

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Uganda has a long history of health research, but still faces critical health problems. It has made a number of recent moves towards building science and technology capacity which could have an impact on local health, if innovation can be fostered and harnessed. Methods Qualitative case study research methodology was used. Data were collected through reviews of academic literature and policy documents and through open-ended, face-to-face interviews with 30 people from across the science-based health innovation system, including government officials, researchers in research institutes and universities, entrepreneurs, international donors, and non-governmental organization representatives. Results Uganda has a range of institutions influencing science-based health innovation, with varying degrees of success. However, the country still lacks a coherent mechanism for effectively coordinating STI policy among all the stakeholders. Classified as a least developed country, Uganda has opted for exemptions from the TRIPS intellectual property protection regime that include permitting parallel importation and providing for compulsory licenses for pharmaceuticals. Uganda is unique in Africa in taking part in the Millennium Science Initiative (MSI, an ambitious though early-stage $30m project, funded jointly by the World Bank and Government of Uganda, to build science capacity and encourage entrepreneurship through funding industry-research collaboration. Two universities – Makerere and Mbarara – stand out in terms of health research, though as yet technology development and commercialization is weak. Uganda has several incubators which are producing low-tech products, and is beginning to move into higher-tech ones like diagnostics. Its pharmaceutical industry has started to create partnerships which encourage innovation. Conclusions Science-based health product innovation is in its early stages in Uganda, as are policies for guiding

Information and Innovation Center as a Factor of NGO Development and Partner in Intellectual and Professional Environment of the Region

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yavorsky, M.S.

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Relevance of forming during the crisis effective public institutions based on self organization of specialists from different professional environments and the role of regional information and innovation centers in the initiation and maintenance of such processes are substantiated. Practical experience of the Lviv State Centre of Science, Innovations and Informatization in the creation and support of NGOs in research and innovation, business and educational fields in Western Ukraine is elucidated.

The future of health IT innovation and informatics: a report from AMIA's 2010 policy meeting

Science.gov (United States)

McGowan, Julie J; Cusack, Caitlin M

2012-01-01

While much attention has been paid to the short-term impact that widespread adoption of health information technology (health IT) will have on the healthcare system, there is a corresponding need to look at the long-term effects that extant policies may have on health IT system resilience, innovation, and related ethical, social/legal issues. The American Medical Informatics Association's 2010 Health Policy Conference was convened to further the national discourse on the issues surrounding these longer-term considerations. Conference participants self-selected into three broad categories: resilience in healthcare and health IT; ethical, legal, and social challenges; and innovation, adoption, and sustainability. The discussions about problem areas lead to findings focusing on the lack of encouragement for long-term IT innovation that may result from current health IT policies; the potential impact of uneven adoption of health IT based on the exclusions of the current financial incentives; the weaknesses of contingency and risk mitigation planning that threaten system resilience; and evolving standards developed in response to challenges relating to the security, integrity, and availability of electronic health information. This paper discusses these findings and also offers recommendations that address the interwoven topics of innovation, resilience, and adoption. The goal of this paper is to encourage public and private sector organizations that have a role in shaping health information policy to increase attention to developing a national strategy that assures that health IT innovation and resilience are not impeded by shorter-term efforts to implement current approaches emphasizing adoption and meaningful use of electronic health records. PMID:22037887

Digital Mental Health - Innovations in Consumer Driven Care.

Science.gov (United States)

Ackerman, Mary Lou; Virani, Tazim; Billings, Barry

2017-01-01

Barriers such as stigma and access issues prevent 60% of Canadians with mental health issues from seeking help. Saint Elizabeth Health Care's IntelligentCare™ Platform supports a range of digital health solutions for holistic health including three specific innovations: a secure social networking tool, an artificial intelligence-driven assistant that uses conversational cognitive behaviour therapy techniques, and a mobile mindfulness meditation application that generates personalized meditation suggestions. People use these self-help tools to cope with their mental health challenges. Healthcare providers are encouraged to explore the benefits and drawbacks of digital solutions for mental health, and consider the new skills, ethical implications and research opportunities that are needed when supporting patients who use these digital tools. © 2017 Longwoods Publishing.

Community mental health care in India.

Science.gov (United States)

Padmavati, R

2005-04-01

Recent times are witnessing methods in the various forms of community care for the mentally ill in India. Non-governmental organizations (NGO) play a pivotal role in filling the gap in the existing mental health services in India and the substantial need for these services. Various strategies that have been employed in community care have attempted to utilize existing community resources for implementation. Informal manpower resources incorporated with specialist psychiatric care and integrated with existing health care facilities have been general strategies. While the feasibility and cost-effectiveness of the NGO operated community outreach programs for the mentally ill have been demonstrated, various factors are seen to influence the planning and execution of such programs. This paper elucidates some critical factors that would need to be considered in community mental health care in India.

Fueling innovation in medical devices (and beyond): venture capital in health care.

Science.gov (United States)

Ackerly, D Clay; Valverde, Ana M; Diener, Lawrence W; Dossary, Kristin L; Schulman, Kevin A

2009-01-01

Innovation in health care requires new ideas and the capital to develop and commercialize those ideas into products or services. The necessary capital is often "venture capital," but the link between public policy and the venture capital industry has not been well examined. In this paper we explore the link between venture capital and innovation in health care, and we present new descriptive data from a survey of health care venture capital fund managers. Respondents generally viewed policy levers (for example, reimbursement and regulations) as important risks to venture capital investments, potentially affecting their ability to raise capital for early-stage investment funds.

The Effect of a Community Health Worker Utilized Mobile Health Application on Maternal Health Knowledge and Behavior: A Quasi-Experimental Study

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Onaedo Ilozumba

2018-05-01

Full Text Available BackgroundMobile technology (mHealth is increasingly being used to achieve improved access and quality of maternal care, particularly in rural areas of low- and middle-income countries. In 2011, a mobile application—Mobile for Mothers (MfM—was implemented in Jharkhand, India to support home visits by community health workers. The objective of this study is to assess the impact of the mHealth intervention on maternal health.MethodsHouseholds from three subdistricts in the Deoghar district of Jharkhand were selected using a multistage cluster sampling approach. Households from the Sarwan subdistrict received the MfM intervention, those from Devipur subdistrict received other interventions asides MfM from the implementing non-governmental organization (NGO, while households from Mohanpur subdistrict received the current standard of care. Women (n = 2,200 between the ages of 18 and 45 who had delivered a baby in the past 1 year were enrolled into the study. The primary outcomes of interest were maternal health knowledge, antenatal care (ANC attendance, and delivery in a health facility.ResultsPost-intervention, women in the MfM group had higher maternal health knowledge, were more likely to attend four or more ANC visits, and deliver at the health facility when compared with the NGO and standard care group. After controlling for predictors, women in the intervention group significantly performed better than both the NGO and standard care groups on all three-outcome variables (all P > 0.05.ConclusionThe results indicate that although the MfM mHealth intervention could influence adherence and practice of recommended maternal health behaviors, it could not overcome key sociocultural determinants of maternal health such as caste and educational status, which are specific to the Indian context. mHealth holds continued promise for maternal health but implementers and policy makers must additionally address health system and sociocultural

NGO 'S ROLE IN SOCIAL ECONOMY

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MARIANA CLAUDIA MUNGIU-PUPĂZAN

2016-06-01

Full Text Available This paper aims to be a company - NGO relationship analysis and points out that a company can find its strategic stakeholders among non - profit organizations. In world practice social responsibility is spoken frequently about the collaboration between the business sector and non - profit. At the international level, NGOs are one of the most important dialogue partners of the business sector. In Romania, NGOs are often seen as something always require organizations that sponsor or if you want to do exercises image. On the one hand NGOs are wondering what to do to see their sponsored projects, although according to modern definitions, sponsorship does not really have much in common with corporate social. On the other hand companies are trying to answer the question "who are strategic stakeholders". Their proactive involvement of the stakeholders helps to cultivate relationships that can provide a competitive advantage especially in times of crisis. Like any business, stakeholder engagement has a number of constraints: requires time, financial and human resources dedicated to rely on a continuous process of monitoring and may require. Moreover, if not properly planned and implemented, could damage relations between the company and stakeholders

How Should Organizations Promote Equitable Distribution of Benefits from Technological Innovation in Health Care?

Science.gov (United States)

Nambisan, Satish; Nambisan, Priya

2017-11-01

Technological innovations typically benefit those who have good access to and an understanding of the underlying technologies. As such, technology-centered health care innovations are likely to preferentially benefit users of privileged socioeconomic backgrounds. Which policies and strategies should health care organizations adopt to promote equitable distribution of the benefits from technological innovations? In this essay, we draw on two important concepts-co-creation (the joint creation of value by multiple parties such as a company and its customers) and digitalization (the application of new digital technologies and the ensuing changes in sociotechnical structures and relationships)-and propose a set of policies and strategies that health care organizations could adopt to ensure that benefits from technological innovations are more equitably distributed among all target populations, including resource-poor communities and individuals. © 2017 American Medical Association. All Rights Reserved.

Innovation

Science.gov (United States)

EPA frames innovation as critical to the protection of human health and the environment through initiatives such as sustainable practices, innovative research, prize competitions, innovation awards, partnerships, and community activities.

Identifying and defining the terms and elements related to a digital health innovation ecosystem

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Iyawa, G

2016-12-01

Full Text Available environment in which digital health systems have to be implemented in South Africa provides for specific challenges relating to environmental, community and physical challenges. By using an in-depth comparative case study within the design science..., Approaches and Experiences: Towards building a South African Digital Health Innovation Ecosystem 2 Strategies, Approaches and Experiences: Towards building a South African Digital Health Innovation Ecosystem First published in December 2016...

Evaluating the Role and Contribution of Innovation to Health and Wealth in the UK: A Review of Innovation, Health and Wealth: Phase 1 Final Report.

Science.gov (United States)

Bienkowska-Gibbs, Teresa; Exley, Josephine; Saunders, Catherine L; Marjanovic, Sonja; Chataway, Joanna; MacLure, Calum; McDonald, Ruth; Ling, Tom

2016-06-20

The Department of Health's Innovation, Health and Wealth (IHW) strategy aimed to introduce a more strategic approach to the spread of innovation across the NHS. This study represents the first phase of a three-year evaluation and aims to map progress towards the IHW strategy and its component actions. This evaluation used a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods: document review, key informant interviews and stakeholder survey. This study also forms the basis for selecting case studies for phase two of the evaluation. Our findings from the interviews and survey suggest broad stakeholder support for the overarching ambitions of the IHW strategy. However, we found variable progress towards the overarching objectives of the eight IHW themes and an ambiguous relationship between many of the themes' objectives and their actions. It was difficult to assess progress on IHW's actions as commitment to the actions, implementation guidance and expected outcomes of the actions were not clearly articulated. The Academic Health Science Networks (AHSNs) and the Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) were reported to be working well, which may be attributed to their clear structures of accountability and earmarked budgets. However, survey respondents and interviewees raised concerns that budgetary pressures may limit the impact of both AHSNs and the SBRI. The main challenges identified for ongoing action were the resources available for their implementation (e.g. Medtech Briefings), lack of awareness of the initiative (e.g. the NICE Implementation Collaborative) and the design of the actions (e.g. the Innovation Scorecard, web portal and High Impact Innovations).

Innovation camp as a method in health education

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Duus, Lene; Ringby, Betina

2017-01-01

Society calls for creative, innovative and enterprising health professionals who also have abilities to work interdisciplinary. New learning methods are required to develop new skills. Health care students must develop mind-sets and skills that enable them to create, develop and take action upon...... new services in new or existing organisations. Students also need to develop skills for interdisciplinary collaboration and develop their own knowledge of different cultures and behaviours. Therefore, educational institutions must challenge students in many different ways....

Innovative financing for late-stage global health research and development: the Global Health Investment Fund.

Science.gov (United States)

Fitchett, Joseph Robert; Fan Li, Julia; Atun, Rifat

2016-01-01

Innovative financing strategies for global health are urgently needed to reinvigorate investment and new tools for impact. Bottleneck areas along the research and development (R&D) pipeline require particular attention, such as the transitions from preclinical discovery to clinical study, and product development to implementation and delivery. Successful organizations mobilizing and disbursing resources through innovating financing mechanisms include UNITAID, the Global Fund, and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. Although precise numbers are poorly documented, estimated investment in low-income settings falls seriously short of local need. This commentary discusses the newly established Global Health Investment Fund as a case study to support late-stage global health R&D. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa teams share early ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

2017-09-29

Sep 29, 2017 ... As the seven-year Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa (IMCHA) ... babies at home — far from medical care should complications arise. ... areas, Hajibedru wants to expand the service to the 120 health centres in ...

Gaming science innovations to integrate health systems science into medical education and practice.

Science.gov (United States)

White, Earla J; Lewis, Joy H; McCoy, Lise

2018-01-01

Health systems science (HSS) is an emerging discipline addressing multiple, complex, interdependent variables that affect providers' abilities to deliver patient care and influence population health. New perspectives and innovations are required as physician leaders and medical educators strive to accelerate changes in medical education and practice to meet the needs of evolving populations and systems. The purpose of this paper is to introduce gaming science as a lens to magnify HSS integration opportunities in the scope of medical education and practice. Evidence supports gaming science innovations as effective teaching and learning tools to promote learner engagement in scientific and systems thinking for decision making in complex scenarios. Valuable insights and lessons gained through the history of war games have resulted in strategic thinking to minimize risk and save lives. In health care, where decisions can affect patient and population outcomes, gaming science innovations have the potential to provide safe learning environments to practice crucial decision-making skills. Research of gaming science limitations, gaps, and strategies to maximize innovations to further advance HSS in medical education and practice is required. Gaming science holds promise to equip health care teams with HSS knowledge and skills required for transformative practice. The ultimate goals are to empower providers to work in complex systems to improve patient and population health outcomes and experiences, and to reduce costs and improve care team well-being.

Creativity and Innovation in Health Care: Tapping Into Organizational Enablers Through Human-Centered Design.

Science.gov (United States)

Zuber, Christi Dining; Moody, Louise

There is an increasing drive in health care for creativity and innovation to tackle key health challenges, improve quality and access, and reduce harm and costs. Human-centered design (HCD) is a potential approach to achieving organizational innovation. However, research suggests the nursing workforce feels unsupported to take the risks needed for innovation, and leaders may not understand the conditions required to fully support them. The aim of this study was to identify enabling conditions that support frontline nurses in their attempts to behave as champions of innovation and change. An HCD workshop was undertaken with 125 nurses employed in clinical practice at Kaiser Permanente. The workshop included empathy mapping and semistructured questions that probed participant experiences with innovation and change. The data were collated and thematic analysis undertaken through a Grounded Theory approach. The data were analyzed to identify key enabling conditions. Seven enablers emerged: personal need for a solution; challenges that have meaningful purpose; clarity of goal and control of resources; active experimentation; experiences indicating progress; positive encouragement and confidence; and provision of psychological safety. These enablers were then translated into pragmatic guidelines for leaders on how the tools of HCD may be leveraged for innovation and change in health care.

Management training in global health education: a Health Innovation Fellowship training program to bring healthcare to low-income communities in Central America.

Science.gov (United States)

Prado, Andrea M; Pearson, Andy A; Bertelsen, Nathan S

2018-01-01

Interprofessional education is increasingly recognized as essential for health education worldwide. Although effective management, innovation, and entrepreneurship are necessary to improve health systems, business schools have been underrepresented in global health education. Central America needs more health professionals trained in health management and innovation to respond to health disparities, especially in rural communities. This paper explores the impact of the Health Innovation Fellowship (HIF), a new training program for practicing health professionals offered jointly by the Central American Healthcare Initiative and INCAE Business School, Costa Rica. Launched in 2014, HIF's goal is to create a network of highly trained interdisciplinary health professionals in competencies to improve health of Central American communities through better health management. The program's fellows carried out innovative healthcare projects in their local regions. The first three annual cohorts (total of 43 fellows) represented all health-related professions and sectors (private, public, and civil society) from six Central American countries. All fellows attended four 1-week, on-site modular training sessions, received ongoing mentorship, and stayed connected through formal and informal networks and webinars through which they exchange knowledge and support each other. CAHI stakeholders supported HIF financially. Impact evaluation of the three-year pilot training program is positive: fellows improved their health management skills and more than 50% of the projects found either financial or political support for their implementation. HIF's strengths include that both program leaders and trainees come from the Global South, and that HIF offers a platform to collaborate with partners in the Global North. By focusing on promoting innovation and management at a top business school in the region, HIF constitutes a novel capacity-building effort within global health education. HIF

Accelerating innovation in information and communication technology for health.

Science.gov (United States)

Crean, Kevin W

2010-02-01

Around the world, inventors are creating novel information and communication technology applications and systems that can improve health for people in disparate settings. However, it is very difficult to find investment funding needed to create business models to expand and develop the prototype technologies. A comprehensive, long-term investment strategy for e-health and m-health is needed. The field of social entrepreneurship offers an integrated approach to develop needed investment models, so that innovations can reach more patients, more effectively. Specialized financing techniques and sustained support from investors can spur the expansion of mature technologies to larger markets, accelerating global health impacts.

Innovations in health service delivery: the corporatization of public hospitals

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Harding, April; Preker, Alexander S

2003-01-01

... hospitals play a critical role in ensuring delivery of health services, less is known about how to improve the efficiency and quality of care provided. Much can be learned in this respect from the experiences of hospital reforms initiated during the 1990s. Innovations in Health Service Delivery: The Corporatization of Public Hospitals is an a...

Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa teams share early ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

Image. Representatives at the opening ceremony. Louise Guenette/IDRC. Representatives from the Canadian Embassy of Senegal, the West Africa Health Organization, IDRC, the Government of Senegal, including the Ministry of Health and Social Action, at the workshop's opening ceremony. As the seven-year Innovating ...

How do medical device manufacturers' websites frame the value of health innovation? An empirical ethics analysis of five Canadian innovations.

Science.gov (United States)

Lehoux, P; Hivon, M; Williams-Jones, B; Miller, F A; Urbach, D R

2012-02-01

While every health care system stakeholder would seem to be concerned with obtaining the greatest value from a given technology, there is often a disconnect in the perception of value between a technology's promoters and those responsible for the ultimate decision as to whether or not to pay for it. Adopting an empirical ethics approach, this paper examines how five Canadian medical device manufacturers, via their websites, frame the corporate "value proposition" of their innovation and seek to respond to what they consider the key expectations of their customers. Our analysis shows that the manufacturers' framing strategies combine claims that relate to valuable socio-technical goals and features such as prevention, efficiency, sense of security, real-time feedback, ease of use and flexibility, all elements that likely resonate with a large spectrum of health care system stakeholders. The websites do not describe, however, how the innovations may impact health care delivery and tend to obfuscate the decisional trade-offs these innovations represent from a health care system perspective. Such framing strategies, we argue, tend to bolster physicians' and patients' expectations and provide a large set of stakeholders with powerful rhetorical tools that may influence the health policy arena. Because these strategies are difficult to counter given the paucity of evidence and its limited use in policymaking, establishing sound collective health care priorities will require solid critiques of how certain kinds of medical devices may provide a better (i.e., more valuable) response to health care needs when compared to others.

[Innovation in pharmaceutical and health biotechnology industries: challenges for a virtuous agenda].

Science.gov (United States)

Vargas, Marco; Gadelha, Carlos Augusto Grabois; Costa, Laís Silveira; Maldonado, José

2012-12-01

Pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries comprise a major production subsystem of the health industrial complex in Brazil. It stands out for both its economic importance and its prominent role in developing new technologies in strategic areas. Strengthening the local production of generic drugs in the last decade has significantly increased the number of Brazilian companies in the local pharmaceutical market and has been an important turning point for this industry's growth. However, there remain major structural bottlenecks both in terms of production and continuous innovation. These bottlenecks reveal the high vulnerability of the Brazilian National Health System and point to the need of public policies that promote strengthening the production base and innovation in the pharmaceutical industry and that at the same time meet health-related social demands in health in Brazil.

Upper secondary school as an innovative health laboratory

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Stine Frydendal

, 2009; Heldbjerg et al., 2009) on cultural and organizational aspects of physical activity in the upper secondary school in a latemodern era. The project aims to provide knowledge about the application of a participatory approach when working with health promotion and thus be conducive to a sustainable...... a methodological study seeking to develop methods in creating organizational change regarding health policies with participation, democracy and innovation as the main focus-areas (Dahl og Juhl: 2009). This method demands involvement from Rysensteen Gymnasium and the design is structured so that ideas, discussions...

Innovations in health care and mortality trends from five cancers in seven European countries between 1970 and 2005.

Science.gov (United States)

Hoffmann, Rasmus; Plug, Iris; McKee, Martin; Khoshaba, Bernadette; Westerling, Ragnar; Looman, Caspar; Rey, Gregoire; Jougla, Eric; Lang, Katrin; Pärna, Kersti; Mackenbach, Johan P

2014-04-01

Although the contribution of health care to survival from cancer has been studied extensively, much less is known about its contribution to population health. We examine how medical innovations have influenced trends in cause-specific mortality at the national level. Based on literature reviews, we selected six innovations with proven effectiveness against cervical cancer, Hodgkin's disease, breast cancer, testicular cancer, and leukaemia. With data on the timing of innovations and cause-specific mortality (1970-2005) from seven European countries we identified associations between innovations and favourable changes in mortality. For none of the five specific cancers, sufficient evidence for an association between introduction of innovations and a positive change in mortality could be found. The highest association was found between the introduction of Tamoxifen and breast cancer mortality. The lack of evidence of health care effectiveness may be due to gradual improvements in treatment, to effects limited to certain age groups or cancer subtypes, and to contemporaneous changes in cancer incidence. Research on the impact of health care innovations on population health is limited by unreliable data on their introduction.

Romania- New Tobacco control law from an NGO perspective

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mihaltan Florin Dumitru

2016-03-01

Full Text Available In our presentation we are evaluating the progress of the tobacco control in Romania looking form the point of view on NGO in the last 26 years. We are signalling the progressive steps towards policy and an advocacy from our perspective and the consequences of our success. The final result is reflected in the new law starting in force on March 17th, 2016, a real advance in our fight. We are identifying in the same time the new challenging problems after launching the new law. Probably the biggest gain of our fight is the extensive partnership with all the factors, our efforts to bring together in a big family as the coalition “Romania Respira” politicians, advocates, judges, economists, young’s and also the new way found to encourage all: mass media, politicians, journalists, public to support us.

[The French health care funding system for research and innovation in oncology].

Science.gov (United States)

Wiernik, Harvey; Katz, Gregory; Coulonjou, Hélène; Salagnac, André; Kletz, Frédéric; Thariat, Juliette

2018-06-01

This article provides an overview of the French health system with respect to allocation of public resources to hospitals, to encourage research and innovation, particularly in the field of oncology. It is explained in a historical, economic and scientific perspective. Important structural and conceptual reforms (T2A, HPST law, etc.) have been carried out. These have significantly impacted the way public funding is allocated. Funding of innovation and research has been modified into a more incentive logic, aimed at strengthening competitiveness between all health care actors. The funding allocation system has evolved towards a more ubiquitous redistribution, including non-academic and private institutions. The baseline endowment includes indicators relating to scientific publications (60% of the endowment), teaching (25%) and clinical trials (15%). Research funding is then redistributed by regional health agencies, and used in health care institutions at the discretion of the directorates. Other funding sources such as calls for grants, funding for mobile research centers and teams, tumor banks and temporary user licenses are also part of the funding by the French Ministry of health. Changes in the health research funding system have an incentive purpose. They have significantly modified the global healthcare landscape. Feedback on these changes will be necessary to assess the success of the reinforcement of the dynamics of research and innovation. Copyright © 2018 Société Française du Cancer. Published by Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

THE ACCEPTANCE OF HEALTH RELATED INNOVATIONS IN TRADITIONAL MEAT PRODUCTS BY CROATIAN CONSUMERS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Danijel Karolyi

2015-09-01

Full Text Available The aim of this study was to examine Croatian consumers’ acceptance of health related innovations in traditional meat products. A face-to-face survey was conducted with a sample of 151 visitors of a specialized fair of traditional food products in Zagreb in 2013. The respondents were asked to indicate their attitudes on a fivepoint scale, where 1 meant rejection or no impact and 5 meant full acceptance or high impact. Results (mean±SD showed the highest level of acceptance for innovations related to better control of smoking conditions (3.3± 1.14 and reduction of salt content (3.1±1.15, followed by reduced fat content (3.0±1.14 and controlled fermentation (2.9±1.12. The perceived negative impact of innovations on traditional character of meat products was highest for fat (3.4±0.99 and salt (3.4±1.03 reduction and lowest for controlled fermentation (3.2±1.04 and smoking conditions (3.2±1.05. With regards to respondents’ socio-demographic features a nonparametric test statistic (Mann-Whitney U revealed a higher acceptance of fat reduction and higher willingness to increase a consumption of healthier traditional meat products among females, while age, education level and income had no influence on the investigated parameters. In addition, some health related innovations; e.g. fat reduction and controlled fermentation were generally less acceptable among respondents with a high consumption frequency of traditional meat products. The results of this preliminary study indicated controlled smoking conditions as the best accepted health related innovation by Croatian consumers with the least negative impact on perceived traditional character of product. In general terms, women were more likely to accept some of the investigated innovations and consequently to increase their consumption of innovate products. However, the most regular consumers of traditional meat products were less open towards innovations which may pose a challenge to

Employee empowerment, innovative behavior and job productivity of public health nurses: a cross-sectional questionnaire survey.

Science.gov (United States)

Chang, Li-Chun; Liu, Chieh-Hsing

2008-10-01

Employee empowerment is an important organizational issue. Empowered employees with new ideas and innovative attributes may increase their ability to respond more effectively to face extensive changes in current public health care work environments. The objective of this study was to investigate the relationships between employee empowerment, innovative behaviors and job productivity of public health nurses (PHNs). This study conducted a cross-sectional research design. Purposive sampling was conducted from six health bureaus in northern Taiwan. 670 PHNs were approached and 576 valid questionnaires were collected, with a response rate of 85.9%. Structured questionnaires were used to collect data by post. Meaning and competence subscales of psychological empowerment, information and opportunity subscales of organizational empowerment, and innovative behaviors were the predictors of job productivity, only accounting for 16.4% of the variance. The competence subscale of psychological empowerment made the most contribution to job productivity (beta = 0.31). Meaning subscale of psychological empowerment has a negative impact on job productivity. Employee empowerment and innovative behavior of PHNs have little influence on job productivity. Employees with greater competence for delivering public health showed higher self-evaluated job productivity. The negative influences on job productivity possibly caused by conflict meaning on public health among PHNs in current public health policy. It should be an issue in further researches. Public health department should strengthen continuing education to foster competence of psychological sense of empowerment and innovative behavior to increase job productivity

Creating a new investment pool for innovative health systems research.

Science.gov (United States)

Laba, Tracey-Lea; Patel, Anushka; Jan, Stephen

2017-05-01

Recent trends in health research funding towards 'safe bets' is discouraging investment into the development of health systems interventions and choking off a vital area of policy-relevant research. This paper argues that to encourage investment into innovative and perceivably riskier health systems research, researchers need to create more attractive business cases by exploring alternative approaches to the design and evaluation of health system interventions. At the same time, the creation of dedicated funding opportunities to support this work, as well as for relevant early career researchers, is needed.

An Innovative Program in the Science of Health Care Delivery: Workforce Diversity in the Business of Health.

Science.gov (United States)

Essary, Alison C; Wade, Nathaniel L

2016-01-01

According to the most recent statistics from the National Center for Education Statistics, disparities in enrollment in undergraduate and graduate education are significant and not improving commensurate with the national population. Similarly, only 12% of graduating medical students and 13% of graduating physician assistant students are from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups. Established in 2012 to promote health care transformation at the organization and system levels, the School for the Science of Health Care Delivery is aligned with the university and college missions to create innovative, interdisciplinary curricula that meet the needs of our diverse patient and community populations. Three-year enrollment trends in the program exceed most national benchmarks, particularly among students who identify as Hispanic and American Indian/Alaska Native. The Science of Health Care Delivery program provides students a seamless learning experience that prepares them to be solutions-oriented leaders proficient in the business of health care, change management, innovation, and data-driven decision making. Defined as the study and design of systems, processes, leadership and management used to optimize health care delivery and health for all, the Science of Health Care Delivery will prepare the next generation of creative, diverse, pioneering leaders in health care.

Open innovation as a new paradigm for global collaborations in health.

Science.gov (United States)

Dandonoli, Patricia

2013-08-30

Open innovation, which refers to combining internal and external ideas and internal and external paths to market in order to achieve advances in processes or technologies, is an attractive paradigm for structuring collaborations between developed and developing country entities and people. Such open innovation collaborations can be designed to foster true co-creation among partners in rich and poor settings, thereby breaking down hierarchies and creating greater impact and value for each partner. Using an example from Concern Worldwide's Innovations for Maternal, Newborn &Child Health initiative, this commentary describes an early-stage pilot project built around open innovation in a low resource setting, which puts communities at the center of a process involving a wide range of partners and expertise, and considers how it could be adapted and make more impactful and sustainable by extending the collaboration to include developed country partners.

Celebrity endorsed music videos: innovation to foster youth health promotion.

Science.gov (United States)

Macnab, A J; Mukisa, R

2018-06-11

There are calls for innovation in health promotion and for current issues to be presented in new and exciting ways; in addition to creating engaging messages, novel ways to deliver health messaging are needed, especially where youth are the key target audience. When pupils in WHO Health Promoting Schools were asked what health messages would resonate with them, they also identified celebrities as the 'messengers' they would be particularly likely to listen to. Expanding on these discussions, the pupils quoted celebrity-recorded music videos containing health and lifestyle messaging as an example of where they had learned from celebrities. Their ability to sing phrases from the songs and repeat key health messages they contained indicated the videos had commanded attention and provided knowledge and perspectives that had been retained. We located on YouTube the video titles the pupils identified and evaluated the content, messaging and production concepts these celebrity-recorded music videos incorporated. All are good examples of the health promotion genre known as education entertainment, where educational content is intentionally included in professionally produced entertainment media to impart knowledge, create favorable attitudes and impact future behaviors. The importance of this genre is growing in parallel with the burgeoning influence of social media. Music videos resonate with youth, and celebrity recordings combine young people's love of music with their fascination for the aura of celebrity. Hence, producing videos that combine an effective health message with celebrity endorsement offers potential as an innovative conduit for health promotion messaging among youth.

Health consumers and stem cell therapy innovation: markets, models and regulation.

Science.gov (United States)

Salter, Brian; Zhou, Yinhua; Datta, Saheli

2014-05-01

Global health consumer demand for stem cell therapies is vibrant, but the supply of treatments from the conventional science-based model of innovation is small and unlikely to increase in the near future. At the same time, several models of medical innovation have emerged that can respond to the demand, often employing a transnational value chain to deliver the product. Much of the commentary has approached the issue from a supply side perspective, demonstrating the extent to which national and transnational regulation fails to impose what are regarded as appropriate standards on the 'illicit' supply of stem cell therapies characterized by little data and poor outcomes. By contrast, this article presents a political economic analysis with a strong demand side perspective, arguing that the problem of what is termed 'stem cell tourism' is embedded in the demand-supply relationship of the health consumer market and its engagement with different types of stem cell therapy innovation. To be meaningful, discussions of regulation must recognize that analysis or risk being sidelined by a market, which ignores their often wishful thinking.

The medium-term sustainability of organisational innovations in the national health service

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Finn Rachael

2011-03-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background There is a growing recognition of the importance of introducing new ways of working into the UK's National Health Service (NHS and other health systems, in order to ensure that patient care is provided as effectively and efficiently as possible. Researchers have examined the challenges of introducing new ways of working--'organisational innovations'--into complex organisations such as the NHS, and this has given rise to a much better understanding of how this takes place--and why seemingly good ideas do not always result in changes in practice. However, there has been less research on the medium- and longer-term outcomes for organisational innovations and on the question of how new ways of working, introduced by frontline clinicians and managers, are sustained and become established in day-to-day practice. Clearly, this question of sustainability is crucial if the gains in patient care that derive from organisational innovations are to be maintained, rather than lost to what the NHS Institute has called the 'improvement-evaporation effect'. Methods The study will involve research in four case-study sites around England, each of which was successful in sustaining its new model of service provision beyond an initial period of pilot funding for new genetics services provided by the Department of Health. Building on findings relating to the introduction and sustainability of these services already gained from an earlier study, the research will use qualitative methods--in-depth interviews, observation of key meetings, and analysis of relevant documents--to understand the longer-term challenges involved in each case and how these were surmounted. The research will provide lessons for those seeking to sustain their own organisational innovations in wide-ranging clinical areas and for those designing the systems and organisations that make up the NHS, to make them more receptive contexts for the sustainment of innovation. Discussion

The medium-term sustainability of organisational innovations in the national health service

Science.gov (United States)

2011-01-01

Background There is a growing recognition of the importance of introducing new ways of working into the UK's National Health Service (NHS) and other health systems, in order to ensure that patient care is provided as effectively and efficiently as possible. Researchers have examined the challenges of introducing new ways of working--'organisational innovations'--into complex organisations such as the NHS, and this has given rise to a much better understanding of how this takes place--and why seemingly good ideas do not always result in changes in practice. However, there has been less research on the medium- and longer-term outcomes for organisational innovations and on the question of how new ways of working, introduced by frontline clinicians and managers, are sustained and become established in day-to-day practice. Clearly, this question of sustainability is crucial if the gains in patient care that derive from organisational innovations are to be maintained, rather than lost to what the NHS Institute has called the 'improvement-evaporation effect'. Methods The study will involve research in four case-study sites around England, each of which was successful in sustaining its new model of service provision beyond an initial period of pilot funding for new genetics services provided by the Department of Health. Building on findings relating to the introduction and sustainability of these services already gained from an earlier study, the research will use qualitative methods--in-depth interviews, observation of key meetings, and analysis of relevant documents--to understand the longer-term challenges involved in each case and how these were surmounted. The research will provide lessons for those seeking to sustain their own organisational innovations in wide-ranging clinical areas and for those designing the systems and organisations that make up the NHS, to make them more receptive contexts for the sustainment of innovation. Discussion Through comparison and

Low-Frequency Gravitational-Wave Science with eLISA/ NGO

Science.gov (United States)

Amaro-Seoane, Pau; Aoudia, Sofiane; Babak, Stanislav; Binetruy, Pierre; Berti, Emanuele; Bohe, Alejandro; Caprini, Chiara; Colpi, Monica; Cornish, Neil J.; Danzmann, Karsten;

NASA Human Health and Performance Center: Open innovation successes and collaborative projects

Science.gov (United States)

Richard, Elizabeth E.; Davis, Jeffrey R.

2014-11-01

In May 2007, what was then the Space Life Sciences Directorate published the 2007 Space Life Sciences Strategy for Human Space Exploration, setting the course for development and implementation of new business models and significant advances in external collaboration over the next five years. The strategy was updated on the basis of these accomplishments and reissued as the NASA Human Health and Performance Strategy in 2012, and continues to drive new approaches to innovation for the directorate. This short paper describes the successful execution of the strategy, driving organizational change through open innovation efforts and collaborative projects, including efforts of the NASA Human Health and Performance Center (NHHPC).

Survival of the project: a case study of ICT innovation in health care.

Science.gov (United States)

Andreassen, Hege K; Kjekshus, Lars Erik; Tjora, Aksel

2015-05-01

From twenty years of information and communication technology (ICT) projects in the health sector, we have learned one thing: most projects remain projects. The problem of pilotism in e-health and telemedicine is a growing concern, both in medical literature and among policy makers, who now ask for large-scale implementation of ICT in routine health service delivery. In this article, we turn the question of failing projects upside down. Instead of investigating the obstacles to implementing ICT and realising permanent changes in health care routines, we ask what makes the temporary ICT project survive, despite an apparent lack of success. Our empirical material is based on Norwegian telemedicine. Through a case study, we take an in-depth look into the history of one particular telemedical initiative and highlight how ICT projects matter on a managerial level. Our analysis reveals how management tasks were delegated to the ICT project, which thus contributed to four processes of organisational control: allocating resources, generating and managing enthusiasm, system correction and aligning local practice and national policies. We argue that the innovation project in itself can be considered an innovation that has become normalised in health care, not in clinical, but in management work. In everyday management, the ICT project appears to be a convenient tool suited to ease the tensions between state regulatory practices and claims of professional autonomy that arise in the wake of new public management reforms. Separating project management and funding from routine practice handles the conceptualised heterogeneity between innovation and routine within contemporary health care delivery. Whilst this separation eases the execution of both normal routines and innovative projects, it also delays expected diffusion of technology. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Effect of elastic and plastic tensile mechanical loading on the magnetic properties of NGO electrical steel

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Leuning, N., E-mail: nora.leuning@iem.rwth-aachen.de [Institute of Electrical Machines, RWTH Aachen University, D-52062 Aachen (Germany); Steentjes, S. [Institute of Electrical Machines, RWTH Aachen University, D-52062 Aachen (Germany); Schulte, M.; Bleck, W. [Steel Institute, RWTH Aachen University, D-52072 Aachen (Germany); Hameyer, K. [Institute of Electrical Machines, RWTH Aachen University, D-52062 Aachen (Germany)

2016-11-01

The magnetic properties of non-grain-oriented (NGO) electrical steels are highly susceptible to mechanical stresses, i.e., residual, external or thermal ones. For rotating electrical machines, mechanical stresses are inevitable and originate from different sources, e.g., material processing, machine manufacturing and operating conditions. The efficiency and specific losses are largely altered by different mechanical stress states. In this paper the effect of tensile stresses and plastic deformations on the magnetic properties of a 2.9 wt% Si electrical steel are studied. Particular attention is paid to the effect of magnetic anisotropy, i.e., the influence of the direction of applied mechanical stress with respect to the rolling direction. Due to mechanical stress, the induced anisotropy has to be evaluated as it is related to the stress-dependent magnetostriction constant and the grain alignment. - Highlights: • A detailed look at magnetic anisotropy of FeSi NGO electrical steel. • Study of magnetic behavior under elastic as well as plastic tensile stresses. • Correlation of magnetic behavior with microscopic deformation mechanisms. • Discussion of detrimental and beneficial effects of external stresses. • Loss separation at different polarizations and frequencies under increasing stress.

Effect of elastic and plastic tensile mechanical loading on the magnetic properties of NGO electrical steel

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Leuning, N.; Steentjes, S.; Schulte, M.; Bleck, W.; Hameyer, K.

2016-01-01

The magnetic properties of non-grain-oriented (NGO) electrical steels are highly susceptible to mechanical stresses, i.e., residual, external or thermal ones. For rotating electrical machines, mechanical stresses are inevitable and originate from different sources, e.g., material processing, machine manufacturing and operating conditions. The efficiency and specific losses are largely altered by different mechanical stress states. In this paper the effect of tensile stresses and plastic deformations on the magnetic properties of a 2.9 wt% Si electrical steel are studied. Particular attention is paid to the effect of magnetic anisotropy, i.e., the influence of the direction of applied mechanical stress with respect to the rolling direction. Due to mechanical stress, the induced anisotropy has to be evaluated as it is related to the stress-dependent magnetostriction constant and the grain alignment. - Highlights: • A detailed look at magnetic anisotropy of FeSi NGO electrical steel. • Study of magnetic behavior under elastic as well as plastic tensile stresses. • Correlation of magnetic behavior with microscopic deformation mechanisms. • Discussion of detrimental and beneficial effects of external stresses. • Loss separation at different polarizations and frequencies under increasing stress.

Open innovation as a new paradigm for global collaborations in health

Science.gov (United States)

2013-01-01

Open innovation, which refers to combining internal and external ideas and internal and external paths to market in order to achieve advances in processes or technologies, is an attractive paradigm for structuring collaborations between developed and developing country entities and people. Such open innovation collaborations can be designed to foster true co-creation among partners in rich and poor settings, thereby breaking down hierarchies and creating greater impact and value for each partner. Using an example from Concern Worldwide’s Innovations for Maternal, Newborn &Child Health initiative, this commentary describes an early-stage pilot project built around open innovation in a low resource setting, which puts communities at the center of a process involving a wide range of partners and expertise, and considers how it could be adapted and make more impactful and sustainable by extending the collaboration to include developed country partners. PMID:24000780

Innovation routes and evidence guidelines for eHealth small and medium-sized enterprises

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Lianne Bodenstaff; Ruud Janssen; Robbert Menko; Irene Krediet; Hilco Prins; Timber Haaker; Sikke Visser; Marike Hettinga

2013-01-01

eHealth applications hold many promises, for instance to improve the quality of health care, to increase its accessibility, or to reduce its cost. Yet, many eHealth innovations never reach the stage where they get embedded into routine health care. This is due in part to a lack of evidence that

Organisational innovation in health services: lessons from the NHS treatment centres

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Gabbay, J

2011-01-01

... design and methods References Index 103 133 147 149 155 165 v List of abbreviationsOrganisational innovation in health services List of abbreviations A&E ACAD DH DTC GP G-Supp NHS NIHR PCT PFI SDO SHA TC accident and emergency (department) Ambulatory Care and Diagnostic Centre Department of Health ('the Department') diagnosis and treatment centr...

Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa: Strengthening ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

The Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa program aims to assist targeted developing countries in sub-Saharan Africa improve maternal, newborn, and ... Le CRDI investit dans des solutions locales aux problèmes auxquels l'Inde est confrontée, comme le stress thermique, la gestion de l'eau et les migrations ...

Interdisciplinary innovations in biomedical and health informatics graduate education.

Science.gov (United States)

Demiris, G

2007-01-01

Biomedical and health informatics (BHI) is a rapidly growing domain that relies on the active collaboration with diverse disciplines and professions. Educational initiatives in BHI need to prepare students with skills and competencies that will allow them to function within and even facilitate interdisciplinary teams (IDT). This paper describes an interdisciplinary educational approach introduced into a BHI graduate curriculum that aims to prepare informatics researchers to lead IDT research. A case study of the "gerontechnology" research track is presented which highlights how the curriculum fosters collaboration with and understanding of the disciplines of Nursing, Engineering, Computer Science, and Health Administration. Gerontechnology is a new interdisciplinary field that focuses on the use of technology to support aging. Its aim is to explore innovative ways to use information technology and develop systems that support independency and increase quality of life for senior citizens. As a result of a large research group that explores "smart home" technologies and the use of information technology, we integrated this new domain into the curriculum providing a platform for computer scientists, engineers, nurses and physicians to explore challenges and opportunities with our informatics students and faculty. The interdisciplinary educational model provides an opportunity for health informatics students to acquire the skills for communication and collaboration with other disciplines. Numerous graduate and postgraduate students have already participated in this initiative. The evaluation model of this approach is presented. Interdisciplinary educational models are required for health informatics graduate education. Such models need to be innovative and reflect the needs and trends in the domains of health care and information technology.

Health innovation for patient safety improvement.

Science.gov (United States)

Sellappans, Renukha; Chua, Siew Siang; Tajuddin, Nur Amani Ahmad; Mei Lai, Pauline Siew

2013-01-01

Medication error has been identified as a major factor affecting patient safety. Many innovative efforts such as Computerised Physician Order Entry (CPOE), a Pharmacy Information System, automated dispensing machines and Point of Administration Systems have been carried out with the aim of improving medication safety. However, areas remain that require urgent attention. One main area will be the lack of continuity of care due to the breakdown of communication between multiple healthcare providers. Solutions may include consideration of "health smart cards" that carry vital patient medical information in the form of a "credit card" or use of the Malaysian identification card. However, costs and technical aspects associated with the implementation of this health smart card will be a significant barrier. Security and confidentiality, on the other hand, are expected to be of primary concern to patients. Challenges associated with the implementation of a health smart card might include physician buy-in for use in his or her everyday practice. Training and technical support should also be available to ensure the smooth implementation of this system. Despite these challenges, implementation of a health smart card moves us closer to seamless care in our country, thereby increasing the productivity and quality of healthcare.

Health innovation for patient safety improvement

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Renukha Sellappans

2013-01-01

Full Text Available Medication error has been identified as a major factor affecting patient safety. Many innovative efforts such as Computerised Physician Order Entry (CPOE, a Pharmacy Information System, automated dispensing machines and Point of Administration Systems have been carried out with the aim of improving medication safety. However, areas remain that require urgent attention. One main area will be the lack of continuity of care due to the breakdown of communication between multiple healthcare providers. Solutions may include consideration of “health smart cards” that carry vital patient medical information in the form of a “credit card” or use of the Malaysian identification card. However, costs and technical aspects associated with the implementation of this health smart card will be a significant barrier. Security and confidentiality, on the other hand, are expected to be of primary concern to patients. Challenges associated with the implementation of a health smart card might include physician buy-in for use in his or her everyday practice. Training and technical support should also be available to ensure the smooth implementation of this system. Despite these challenges, implementation of a health smart card moves us closer to seamless care in our country, thereby increasing the productivity and quality of healthcare.

The sociology of space as a catalyst for innovation in the health sector.

Science.gov (United States)

Saidi, Trust; de Villiers, Katusha; Douglas, Tania S

2017-05-01

This paper reviews the role of space in facilitating innovation. It draws on the sociology of space in exploring the social practices, institutional forces and material complexity of how people and spaces interact. We assess how space influences the development of innovative solutions to challenges in the health sector. Our aim is to advance an understanding of the social production of space for healthcare innovation. We draw empirical examples from the Innovation Hub at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town to illustrate that innovation does not take place in an institutional vacuum, but requires space that facilitates interaction of different players. This paper demonstrates that space matters in promoting innovation, particularly through its influence on social relationships and networks. An attractive and novel space, which is different from the usual workplace, stimulates innovation, mainly through being a base for the creation of an ecosystem for the productive interaction of different players. The interaction is important in inspiring new ideas, facilitating creative thought processes, maintaining the flow of information and bringing innovation to life. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Health technology assessment. Evaluation of biomedical innovative technologies.

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Turchetti, Giuseppe; Spadoni, Enza; Geisler, Eliezer Elie

2010-01-01

This article describes health technology assessment (HTA) as an evaluation tool that applies systematic methods of inquiry to the generation and use of health technologies and new products. The focus of this article is on the contributions of HTA to the management of the new product development effort in the biomedical organization. Critical success factors (CSFs) are listed, and their role in assessing success is defined and explained. One of the conclusions of this article is that HTA is a powerful tool for managers in the biomedical sector, allowing them to better manage their innovation effort in their continuing struggle for competitiveness and survival.

Afican Health Sciences Vol 9 No 2.pmd

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Administrator

Intra-household differences in health seeking behaviour for orphans ... 1 Department of Psychiatry, Makerere University College of Health Sciences, ... closing the gap between orphans and non-orphans. This ... the degree to which the NGO support had translated into ... in Makulubita sub-county and 195 children (an equal.

Introducing a complex health innovation--primary health care reforms in Estonia (multimethods evaluation).

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Atun, Rifat Ali; Menabde, Nata; Saluvere, Katrin; Jesse, Maris; Habicht, Jarno

2006-11-01

All post-Soviet countries are trying to reform their primary health care (PHC) systems. The success to date has been uneven. We evaluated PHC reforms in Estonia, using multimethods evaluation: comprising retrospective analysis of routine health service data from Estonian Health Insurance Fund and health-related surveys; documentary analysis of policy reports, laws and regulations; key informant interviews. We analysed changes in organisational structure, regulations, financing and service provision in Estonian PHC system as well as key informant perceptions on factors influencing introduction of reforms. Estonia has successfully implemented and scaled-up multifaceted PHC reforms, including new organisational structures, user choice of family physicians (FPs), new payment methods, specialist training for family medicine, service contracts for FPs, broadened scope of services and evidence-based guidelines. These changes have been institutionalised. PHC effectiveness has been enhanced, as evidenced by improved management of key chronic conditions by FPs in PHC setting and reduced hospital admissions for these conditions. Introduction of PHC reforms - a complex innovation - was enhanced by strong leadership, good co-ordination between policy and operational level, practical approach to implementation emphasizing simplicity of interventions to be easily understood by potential adopters, an encircling strategy to roll-out which avoided direct confrontations with narrow specialists and opposing stakeholders in capital Tallinn, careful change-management strategy to avoid health reforms being politicized too early in the process, and early investment in training to establish a critical mass of health professionals to enable rapid operationalisation of policies. Most importantly, a multifaceted and coordinated approach to reform - with changes in laws; organisational restructuring; modifications to financing and provider payment systems; creation of incentives to enhance

Applying the Innov8 approach for reviewing national health programmes to leave no one behind: lessons learnt from Indonesia

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Saint, Victoria; Floranita, Rustini; Koemara Sakti, Gita Maya; Pambudi, Imran; Hermawan, Lukas; Villar, Eugenio; Magar, Veronica

2018-01-01

ABSTRACT The World Health Organization’s Innov8 Approach for Reviewing National Health Programmes to Leave No One Behind is an eight-step process that supports the operationalization of the Sustainable Development Goals’ commitment to ‘leave no one behind’. In 2014–2015, Innov8 was adapted and applied in Indonesia to review how the national neonatal and maternal health action plans could become more equity-oriented, rights-based and gender-responsive, and better address critical social determinants of health. The process was led by the Indonesian Ministry of Health, with the support of WHO. It involved a wide range of actors and aligned with/fed into the drafting of the maternal newborn health action plan and the implementation planning of the newborn action plan. Key activities included a sensitization meeting, diagnostic checklist, review workshop and in-country work by the review teams. This ‘methods forum’ article describes this adaptation and application process, the outcomes and lessons learnt. In conjunction with other sources, Innov8 findings and recommendations informed national and sub-national maternal and neonatal action plans and programming to strengthen a ‘leave no one behind’ approach. As follow-up during 2015–2017, components of the Innov8 methodology were integrated into district-level planning processes for maternal and newborn health, and Innov8 helped generate demand for health inequality monitoring and its use in planning. In Indonesia, Innov8 enhanced national capacity for equity-oriented, rights-based and gender-responsive approaches and addressing critical social determinants of health. Adaptation for the national planning context (e.g. decentralized structure) and linking with health inequality monitoring capacity building were important lessons learnt. The pilot of Innov8 in Indonesia suggests that this approach can help operationalize the SDGs’ commitment to leave no one behind, in particular in relation to

Innovative Approaches Address Aging and Mental Health Needs in LGBTQ Communities.

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Hoy-Ellis, Charles P; Ator, Michael; Kerr, Christopher; Milford, Jessica

2016-01-01

LGBTQ older adults have higher levels of psychological distress as compared to older adults in general. They also experience multiple barriers to accessing equitable, culturally competent mental health and aging services because of their distinct histories and particular social contexts. This article discusses this lack of access to services, and highlights an innovative way mental health services are being delivered in LGBTQ communities.

The Alliance for Innovation in Maternal Health Care: A Way Forward.

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Mahoney, Jeanne

2018-06-01

The Alliance for Innovation in Maternal Health is a program supported by the Health Services Resource Administration to reduce maternal mortality and severe maternal morbidity in the United States. This program develops bundles of evidence based action steps for birth facilities to adapt. Progress is monitored at the facility, state and national levels to foster data-driven quality improvement efforts.

Identifying essential components of a digital health innovation ecosystem for the Namibian context: findings from a Delphi study

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Iyawa, GE

2017-01-01

Full Text Available The concept of digital health innovation ecosystems is an emerging body of literature which suggests that components of digital health, innovation and digital ecosystems are important in the administration and delivery of healthcare services...

Health research, development and innovation in England from 1988 to 2013: from research production to knowledge mobilization.

Science.gov (United States)

Walshe, Kieran; Davies, Huw T O

2013-10-01

This paper presents a critical analysis of the development of government policy and practice on health research, development and innovation over the last 25 years - starting from the publication of a seminal report from the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee in 1988. We first set out to map and analyse the trends in ideas and thinking that have shaped research policy and practice over this period, and to put the development of health research, development and innovation in the wider context of health system reforms and changes. We argue that though this has been a transformative period for health research, rather less progress has been made in the domains of development and innovation, and we offer an analysis of why this might be the case. Drawing on advances in our understanding about how research informs practice, we then make the case for a more integrative model of research, development and innovation. This leads us to conclude that recent experiments with Collaborations for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care and Academic Health Science Centres and Networks offer some important lessons for future policy directions.

Accelerating Innovation Through Coopetition: The Innovation Learning Network Experience.

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McCarthy, Chris; Ford Carleton, Penny; Krumpholz, Elizabeth; Chow, Marilyn P

Coopetition, the simultaneous pursuit of cooperation and competition, is a growing force in the innovation landscape. For some organizations, the primary mode of innovation continues to be deeply secretive and highly competitive, but for others, a new style of shared challenges, shared purpose, and shared development has become a superior, more efficient way of working to accelerate innovation capabilities and capacity. Over the last 2 decades, the literature base devoted to coopetition has gradually expanded. However, the field is still in its infancy. The majority of coopetition research is qualitative, primarily consisting of case studies. Few studies have addressed the nonprofit sector or service industries such as health care. The authors believe that this article may offer a unique perspective on coopetition in the context of a US-based national health care learning alliance designed to accelerate innovation, the Innovation Learning Network or ILN. The mission of the ILN is to "Share the joy and pain of innovation," accelerating innovation by sharing solutions, teaching techniques, and cultivating friendships. These 3 pillars (sharing, teaching, and cultivating) form the foundation for coopetition within the ILN. Through the lens of coopetition, we examine the experience of the ILN over the last 10 years and provide case examples that illustrate the benefits and challenges of coopetition in accelerating innovation in health care.

77 FR 4326 - Announcement of Requirements and Registration for “Health Innovations in Commuting Challenge”

Science.gov (United States)

2012-01-27

... known about the health of workers during commutes beyond population studies on general health impact... innovative development. 3. Understanding of effects of automobile commutes on health outcomes. Additional... DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES Announcement of Requirements and Registration for ``Health...

Promoting development and uptake of health innovations: The Nose to Tail Tool [version 1; referees: 2 approved

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Archna Gupta

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Introduction Health sector management is increasingly complex as new health technologies, treatments, and innovative service delivery strategies are developed. Many of these innovations are implemented prematurely, or fail to be implemented at scale, resulting in substantial wasted resources.   Methods A scoping review was conducted to identify articles that described the scale up process conceptually or that described an instance in which a healthcare innovation was scaled up. We define scale up as the expansion and extension of delivery or access to an innovation for all end users in a jurisdiction who will benefit from it. Results Sixty nine articles were eligible for review. Frequently described stages in the innovation process and contextual issues that influence progress through each stage were mapped. 16 stages were identified: 12 deliberation and 4 action stages. Included papers suggest that innovations progress through stages of maturity and the uptake of innovation depends on the innovation aligning with the interests of 3 critical stakeholder groups (innovators, end users and the decision makers and is also influenced by 3 broader contexts (social and physical environment, the health system, and the regulatory, political and economic environment. The 16 stages form the rows of the Nose to Tail Tool (NTT grid and the 6 contingency factors form columns. The resulting stage-by-issue grid consists of 72 cells, each populated with cell-specific questions, prompts and considerations from the reviewed literature. Conclusion We offer a tool that helps stakeholders identify the stage of maturity of their innovation, helps facilitate deliberative discussions on the key considerations for each major stakeholder group and the major contextual barriers that the innovation faces. We believe the NTT will help to identify potential problems that the innovation will face and facilitates early modification, before large investments are made in a

"You are the vanguard of Cairo". NGO / Youth Fora.

Science.gov (United States)

Clinton, H R

1999-01-01

Everyone has a role to play in realizing the goals of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) program of action. The concerns of young people presented at the Youth Forum will hopefully be kept at the forefront of Cairo+5 deliberations. Innumerable women around the world in every country struggle daily to care for and education their children, to gain greater control over their lives, and to contribute to the progress being made in their communities and countries. The nongovernmental organization (NGO) and youth fora of the Cairo+5 proceedings demonstrate that the discussions about global challenges and their solutions are no longer being held and decided upon solely by government officials and policy-makers behind closed doors. Rather, NGOs have finally taken their proper place in the debate, to help ordinary citizens be heard on the critical issues which affect their lives. Efforts must also continue to be made to reach out to young people, as well as fathers, sons, and husbands.

E-health in low- and middle-income countries: findings from the Center for Health Market Innovations.

Science.gov (United States)

Lewis, Trevor; Synowiec, Christina; Lagomarsino, Gina; Schweitzer, Julian

2012-05-01

To describe how information communication technology (ICT) is being used by programmes that seek to improve private sector health financing and delivery in low- and middle-income countries, including the main uses of the technology and the types of technologies being used. In-country partners in 16 countries directly searched systematically for innovative health programmes and compiled profiles in the Center for Health Market Innovations' database. These data were supplemented through literature reviews and with self-reported data supplied by the programmes themselves. In many low- and middle-income countries, ICT is being increasingly employed for different purposes in various health-related areas. Of ICT-enabled health programmes, 42% use it to extend geographic access to health care, 38% to improve data management and 31% to facilitate communication between patients and physicians outside the physician's office. Other purposes include improving diagnosis and treatment (17%), mitigating fraud and abuse (8%) and streamlining financial transactions (4%). The most common devices used in technology-enabled programmes are phones and computers; 71% and 39% of programmes use them, respectively, and the most common applications are voice (34%), software (32%) and text messages (31%). Donors are the primary funders of 47% of ICT-based health programmes. Various types of ICT are being employed by private organizations to address key health system challenges. For successful implementation, however, more sustainable sources of funding, greater support for the adoption of new technologies and better ways of evaluating impact are required.

It Takes More than a Village: Building a Network of Safety in Nepal's Mountain Communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Adams, Vincanne; Craig, Sienna; Samen, Arlene; Bhatta, Surya

2016-12-01

Purpose This report from the field details the ways that one small maternal child health NGO, which began its work in Tibet and now works in the mountain communities of Nepal, has established a model for integrated healthcare delivery and support it calls the "network of safety." Description It discusses some of the challenges faced both by the NGO and by the rural mountain communities with whom it partners, as well as with the government of Nepal. Conclusion This report describes and analyzes successful efforts to reduce maternal and infant mortality in a culturally astute, durable, and integrated way, as well as examples of innovation and success experienced by enacting the network of safety model.

Nursing operations automation and health care technology innovations: 2025 and beyond.

Science.gov (United States)

Suby, ChrysMarie

2013-01-01

This article reviews why nursing operations automation is important, reviews the impact of computer technology on nursing from a historical perspective, and considers the future of nursing operations automation and health care technology innovations in 2025 and beyond. The increasing automation in health care organizations will benefit patient care, staffing and scheduling systems and central staffing offices, census control, and measurement of patient acuity.

Innovative Power of Health Care Organisations Affects IT Adoption: A bi-National Health IT Benchmark Comparing Austria and Germany.

Science.gov (United States)

Hüsers, Jens; Hübner, Ursula; Esdar, Moritz; Ammenwerth, Elske; Hackl, Werner O; Naumann, Laura; Liebe, Jan David

2017-02-01

Multinational health IT benchmarks foster cross-country learning and have been employed at various levels, e.g. OECD and Nordic countries. A bi-national benchmark study conducted in 2007 revealed a significantly higher adoption of health IT in Austria compared to Germany, two countries with comparable healthcare systems. We now investigated whether these differences still persisted. We further studied whether these differences were associated with hospital intrinsic factors, i.e. the innovative power of the organisation and hospital demographics. We thus performed a survey to measure the "perceived IT availability" and the "innovative power of the hospital" of 464 German and 70 Austrian hospitals. The survey was based on a questionnaire with 52 items and was given to the directors of nursing in 2013/2014. Our findings confirmed a significantly greater IT availability in Austria than in Germany. This was visible in the aggregated IT adoption composite score "IT function" as well as in the IT adoption for the individual functions "nursing documentation" (OR = 5.98), "intensive care unit (ICU) documentation" (OR = 2.49), "medication administration documentation" (OR = 2.48), "electronic archive" (OR = 2.27) and "medication" (OR = 2.16). "Innovative power" was the strongest factor to explain the variance of the composite score "IT function". It was effective in hospitals of both countries but significantly more effective in Austria than in Germany. "Hospital size" and "hospital system affiliation" were also significantly associated with the composite score "IT function", but they did not differ between the countries. These findings can be partly associated with the national characteristics. Indicators point to a more favourable financial situation in Austrian hospitals; we thus argue that Austrian hospitals may possess a larger degree of financial freedom to be innovative and to act accordingly. This study is the first to empirically demonstrate the

An innovative approach study “Health students example”

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Akyurt Nuran

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Globalization; A process of international integration arising from the exchange of products, ideas, cultures and worldviews. Globalization is an economic as well as political, technological and cultural process. As in other areas, technological developments have brought innovations into the training of health care workers, as well as access to information and the use of this information. These developments necessitated new orientations in the education systems of health students. In this study, the effects of computer assisted instructions involving the topics of medical and vocational terminology course on the attitudes and academic achievement levels of students’ use of medical and vocational terms were investigated. Marmara University Health Services Vocational School Medical Imaging students constitute the sample of the research. In the experimental group, medical and vocational terminology topics were processed and tested by computer aided instruction method for 12 weeks.

Quality and Innovation: Redesigning a Coordinated and Connected Health System.

Science.gov (United States)

Vaughan, Peter W

2017-01-01

Nova Scotia's consolidated health system was launched on April 1, 2015. This new approach to organizing health administration and services in the province arose out of necessity. When planning began, Nova Scotia was spending 41% of its annual budget on health services. In comparison to other provinces and territories, our per capita health-related spending was among the highest in the country, we had one of Canada's oldest populations and we had some of the worst health outcomes. Clearly, we could not continue to do the same things and expect different results. Both the life sciences and technology are changing at breakneck speed, while design of healthcare delivery has barely moved beyond a mid-twentieth century paternalistic provider-centric model. Nova Scotia's transformation journey was facilitated by a major policy effort 20 years earlier that had integrated emergency health services across the province. Our aim was to build on that foundation by integrating administration in order to build primary care networks with enhanced regional specialty services, with tertiary services located in Halifax. The goal of health system innovation in Nova Scotia was - and is - based firmly on the dimensions of quality: safe care that avoids harming patients; effective care that is based on levels of evidence to achieve scalability; access to care that is focused on individuals; efficient care that reduces waste, time, energy and supplies; and equitable care that ensures a system is in place that mitigates differences in geography and social economic status. The author offers a sketch of the principal initiatives, challenges, considerations, approaches and lessons involved in this multi-factorial, multi-stakeholder innovation process.

Using diffusion of innovation theory to understand the factors impacting patient acceptance and use of consumer e-health innovations: a case study in a primary care clinic.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Xiaojun; Yu, Ping; Yan, Jun; Ton A M Spil, Ir

2015-02-21

Consumer e-Health is a potential solution to the problems of accessibility, quality and costs of delivering public healthcare services to patients. Although consumer e-Health has proliferated in recent years, it remains unclear if patients are willing and able to accept and use this new and rapidly developing technology. Therefore, the aim of this research is to study the factors influencing patients' acceptance and usage of consumer e-health innovations. A simple but typical consumer e-health innovation--an e-appointment scheduling service--was developed and implemented in a primary health care clinic in a regional town in Australia. A longitudinal case study was undertaken for 29 months after system implementation. The major factors influencing patients' acceptance and use of the e-appointment service were examined through the theoretical lens of Rogers' innovation diffusion theory. Data were collected from the computer log records of 25,616 patients who visited the medical centre in the entire study period, and from in-depth interviews with 125 patients. The study results show that the overall adoption rate of the e-appointment service increased slowly from 1.5% at 3 months after implementation, to 4% at 29 months, which means only the 'innovators' had used this new service. The majority of patients did not adopt this innovation. The factors contributing to the low the adoption rate were: (1) insufficient communication about the e-appointment service to the patients, (2) lack of value of the e-appointment service for the majority of patients who could easily make phone call-based appointment, and limitation of the functionality of the e-appointment service, (3) incompatibility of the new service with the patients' preference for oral communication with receptionists, and (4) the limitation of the characteristics of the patients, including their low level of Internet literacy, lack of access to a computer or the Internet at home, and a lack of experience with

The Evolution of an Innovative Community-Engaged Health Navigator Program to Address Social Determinants of Health.

Science.gov (United States)

Page-Reeves, Janet; Moffett, Maurice L; Steimel, Leah; Smith, Daryl T

Health navigators and other types of community health workers (CHWs) have become recognized as essential components of quality care, and key for addressing health disparities owing to the complex health care services landscape presents almost insurmountable challenges for vulnerable individuals. Bernalillo County, New Mexico, has high rates of uninsurance, poverty, and food insecurity. The design of the Pathways to a Healthy Bernalillo County Program (BP) has evolved innovations that are unique in terms of program stability and security, expansive reach, and community capacity across six domains: sustainable public mechanism for program funding, involvement of community organizations in designing the program, expanded focus to address the broader social determinants of health with targeted outreach, an integrated, community-based implementation structure, an outcomes-based payment structure, and using an adaptive program design that actively incorporates navigators in the process. In 2008, the Pathways to a Healthy Bernalillo County Program (BP), located in the Albuquerque metropolitan area in central New Mexico, was established to provide navigation and support for the most vulnerable county residents. BP is funded through a 1% carve out of county mill levy funds. The pathways model is an outcome-based approach for health and social services coordination that uses culturally competent CHW as "navigators" trained to connect at-risk individuals to needed health and social services. One of the important innovations of the pathways approach is a shift in focus from merely providing discrete services to confirming healthy outcomes for the individual patient.

Drug delivery system innovation and Health Technology Assessment: Upgrading from Clinical to Technological Assessment.

Science.gov (United States)

Panzitta, Michele; Bruno, Giorgio; Giovagnoli, Stefano; Mendicino, Francesca R; Ricci, Maurizio

2015-11-30

Health Technology Assessment (HTA) is a multidisciplinary health political instrument that evaluates the consequences, mainly clinical and economical, of a health care technology; the HTA aim is to produce and spread information on scientific and technological innovation for health political decision making process. Drug delivery systems (DDS), such as nanocarriers, are technologically complex but they have pivotal relevance in therapeutic innovation. The HTA process, as commonly applied to conventional drug evaluation, should upgrade to a full pharmaceutical assessment, considering the DDS complexity. This is useful to study more in depth the clinical outcome and to broaden its critical assessment toward pharmaceutical issues affecting the patient and not measured by the current clinical evidence approach. We draw out the expertise necessary to perform the pharmaceutical assessment and we propose a format to evaluate the DDS technological topics such as formulation and mechanism of action, physicochemical characteristics, manufacturing process. We integrated the above-mentioned three points in the Evidence Based Medicine approach, which is data source for any HTA process. In this regard, the introduction of a Pharmaceutics Expert figure in the HTA could be fundamental to grant a more detailed evaluation of medicine product characteristics and performances and to help optimizing DDS features to overcome R&D drawbacks. Some aspects of product development, such as manufacturing processes, should be part of the HTA as innovative manufacturing processes allow new products to reach more effectively patient bedside. HTA so upgraded may encourage resource allocating payers to invest in innovative technologies and providers to focus on innovative material properties and manufacturing processes, thus contributing to bring more medicines in therapy in a sustainable manner. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Undocumented migrants have diverse health problems

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ehmsen, Boje Kvorning; Biswas, Dan; Jensen, Natasja Koitszch

2014-01-01

on the International Classification of Primary Care, 2nd Edition (ICPC-2). RESULTS: A total of 830 patients (39.75% women and 60.25% men) visited the clinic, which led to a total of 2,088 visits and 1,384 ICPC-2 classifications. The patients seen had 94 different nationalities. The most common reasons for medical......INTRODUCTION: In 2008, 1.9-3.8 million undocumented migrants lived in Europe. We aimed to strengthen the evidence base on undocumented migrants' health problems by describing characteristics of undocumented migrant patients in a Danish non-governmental organisation (NGO) health clinic. MATERIAL...... contact correspond well with the pattern seen in general practice and several chronic and severe cases were observed in the NGO clinic. Furthermore, a larger share of pregnant women presented (11.6%) compared with a Danish general practice (5.1%), and these were seen first in a late gestational age...

The UK National Health Service's 'innovation agenda': lessons on commercialisation and trust.

Science.gov (United States)

Sterckx, Sigrid; Cockbain, Julian

2014-01-01

The UK National Health Service (the 'NHS'), encouraged by the 2011 report Innovation Health and Wealth, Accelerating Adoption and Diffusion in the NHS, and empowered by the Health and Social Care Act 2012, is in the process of adopting a new agenda for stimulating innovation in healthcare. For this, the bodies, body materials, and confidential health information of NHS patients may be co-opted. We explain why this brings the NHS into a moral conflict with its basic goal of providing a universal healthcare service. Putting NHS databases at the disposal of industry, without addressing ethical concerns regarding the privacy, autonomy, and moral integrity of patients and without requiring a 'kick-back' to enhance the service that the NHS provides, is inappropriate. As this article shows, with reference to the commercial arena of direct-to-consumer genetic testing, it is crucial that patient and public trust in the NHS is not eroded. © The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press; all rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Innovation in health service delivery: integrating community health assistants into the health system at district level in Zambia.

Science.gov (United States)

Zulu, Joseph Mumba; Hurtig, Anna-Karin; Kinsman, John; Michelo, Charles

2015-01-28

To address the huge human resources for health gap in Zambia, the Ministry of Health launched the National Community Health Assistant Strategy in 2010. The strategy aims to integrate community-based health workers into the health system by creating a new group of workers, called community health assistants (CHAs). However, literature suggests that the integration process of national community-based health worker programmes into health systems has not been optimal. Conceptually informed by the diffusion of innovations theory, this paper qualitatively aimed to explore the factors that shaped the acceptability and adoption of CHAs into the health system at district level in Zambia during the pilot phase. Data gathered through review of documents, 6 focus group discussions with community leaders, and 12 key informant interviews with CHA trainers, supervisors and members of the District Health Management Team were analysed using thematic analysis. The perceived relative advantage of CHAs over existing community-based health workers in terms of their quality of training and scope of responsibilities, and the perceived compatibility of CHAs with existing groups of health workers and community healthcare expectations positively facilitated the integration process. However, limited integration of CHAs in the district health governance system hindered effective programme trialability, simplicity and observability at district level. Specific challenges at this level included a limited information flow and sense of programme ownership, and insufficient documentation of outcomes. The district also had difficulties in responding to emergent challenges such as delayed or non-payment of CHA incentives, as well as inadequate supervision and involvement of CHAs in the health posts where they are supposed to be working. Furthermore, failure of the health system to secure regular drug supplies affected health service delivery and acceptability of CHA services at community level. The

Perspectives on a Learning-Model for Innovating Game-Based Movement in Sports and Health

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Elbæk, Lars; Friis, Jørgen Jakob

2017-01-01

science and health education. We therefore ask: Which learning approach and educational factors does a learning model need to provide, in order to establish the best foundation for learning innovation and the design of game-based movement solutions within sport and health education? This paper suggests......As fitness trackers promote the quantifiable self and exergaming and interactive playful installations find their way into the public domain, the design for movement comes into focus. New trends like mobile platforms for gamed-based interaction, such as Pokémon GO, are also attempting to promote...... an active lifestyle. Such digitally supported movement promote health and underlines a need for students to understand that movement design incorporates many aspects: technology, gamification, motivation and understanding of health. To support this, a movement innovation program was needed at our sports...

Intent to Sustain Use of a Mental Health Innovation by School Providers: What Matters Most?

Science.gov (United States)

Livet, Melanie; Yannayon, Mary; Kocher, Kelly; McMillen, Janey

2017-01-01

Despite innovations being routinely introduced in schools to support the mental health of students, few are successfully maintained over time. This study explores the role of innovation characteristics, individual attitudes and skills, and organizational factors in school providers' decisions to continue use of "Centervention," a…

Towards a framework for business model innovation in health care delivery in developing countries.

Science.gov (United States)

Castano, Ramon

2014-12-02

Uncertainty and information asymmetries in health care are the basis for a supply-sided mindset in the health care industry and for a business model for hospitals and doctor's practices; these two models have to be challenged with business model innovation. The three elements which ensure this are standardizability, separability, and patient-centeredness. As scientific evidence advances and outcomes are more predictable, standardization is more feasible. If a standardized process can also be separated from the hospital and doctor's practice, it is more likely that innovative business models emerge. Regarding patient centeredness, it has to go beyond the oversimplifying approach to patient satisfaction with amenities and interpersonal skills of staff, to include the design of structure and processes starting from patients' needs, expectations, and preferences. Six business models are proposed in this article, including those of hospitals and doctor's practices. Unravelling standardized and separable processes from the traditional hospital setting will increase hospital expenditure, however, the new business models would reduce expenses. The net effect on efficiency could be argued to be positive. Regarding equity in access to high-quality care, most of the innovations described along these business models have emerged in developing countries; it is therefore reasonable to be optimistic regarding their impact on access by the poor. These models provide a promising route to achieve sustainable universal access to high quality care by the poor. Business model innovation is a necessary step to guarantee sustainability of health care systems; standardizability, separability, and patient-centeredness are key elements underlying the six business model innovations proposed in this article.

Health and innovation: economic dynamics and Welfare State in Brazil.

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Gadelha, Carlos Augusto Grabois; Braga, Patrícia Seixas da Costa

2016-11-03

The effective enforcement of the access to healthcare as fundamental right requires an important theoretical and political effort at linking the often contradictory economic and social dimensions of development. This study suggests the need for a systemic view of policies related to the industrial base and innovation in health and the construction of the Brazilian Unified National Health System (SUS). The authors investigate the relations between health, innovation, and development, seeking to show and update the political, economic, and social determinants of the recent Brazilian experience with the Health Economic-Industrial Complex (HEIC). They discuss how the agenda for innovation and domestic industrial production in health gained a central place in the project for construction of the SUS. The article thus seeks to link inherent issues from the agenda for development, production, and innovation to social policy in healthcare, as observed in recent years, and based on this analysis, points to political and conceptual challenges for implementing the SUS, especially as regards strengthening its technological and industrial base. As a byproduct, the article develops an analytical and factual focus on the consolidation of the HEIC in Brazil, both as a dynamic vector of industrial development, generating investment, income, employment, and innovations, and as a decisive element for reducing vulnerability and structural dependence in health. The authors aim to show that strengthening the SUS and orienting it to social needs is an essential part of building a social Welfare State in Brazil. Resumo: A efetivação da saúde como um direito fundamental exige importante esforço, teórico e político, de articulação das dimensões econômicas e sociais, por vezes contraditórias, do desenvolvimento. Este trabalho indica a necessidade de um olhar sistêmico das políticas relacionadas à base produtiva e de inovação em saúde e à construção do Sistema Único de Sa

Innovative financing instruments for global health 2002–15: a systematic analysis

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Prof Rifat Atun, FRCP

2017-07-01

Full Text Available Development assistance for health (DAH, the value of which peaked in 2013 and fell in 2015, is unlikely to rise substantially in the near future, increasing reliance on domestic and innovative financing sources to sustain health programmes in low-income and middle-income countries. We examined innovative financing instruments (IFIs—financing schemes that generate and mobilise funds—to estimate the quantum of financing mobilised from 2002 to 2015. We identified ten IFIs, which mobilised US$8·9 billion (2·3% of overall DAH in 2002–15. The funds generated by IFIs were channelled mostly through GAVI and the Global Fund, and used for programmes for new and underused vaccines, HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, and maternal and child health. Vaccination programmes received the largest amount of funding ($2·6 billion, followed by HIV/AIDS ($1080·7 million and malaria ($1028·9 million, with no discernible funding targeted to non-communicable diseases.

Kangaroo Mother Care in Colombia: A Subaltern Health Innovation against For-profit Biomedicine.

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Abadía-Barrero, César Ernesto

2018-01-24

This ethnographic study presents the origins, growth, and collapse of the first Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC) program, a well-established practice for neonatal care created in 1978 in Colombia. The WHO and UNICEF praised this zero-cost revolutionary technique for its promotion of skin-to-skin contact between premature and low-birth-weight newborns and family members. KMC facilitates early hospital discharge, brings many clinical and psychological benefits, and constitutes an excellent alternative to placing babies in incubators. However, these benefits and political potential against biomedical interventions were undermined after being relabeled as a "reverse innovation," a business concept that encourages corporate investments in low-income countries to develop technologies that can both solve global health problems and boost multinational corporations profits. In response, I propose "subaltern health innovations" as a label for KMC that accounts for the power dynamics in global health between health care initiatives that originate in the Global South and neoliberal configurations of for-profit biomedicine. © 2018 by the American Anthropological Association.

Development, health, and international policy: the research and innovation dimension.

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Buss, Paulo Marchiori; Chamas, Claudia; Faid, Miriam; Morel, Carlos

2016-11-03

This text main objective is to discuss development and health from the perspective of the influence of global health governance, using as the tracer the dimension of research, development, and innovation policies in health, which relate to both important inputs for the health system, like drugs and medicines, vaccines, diagnostic reagents, and equipment, and innovative concepts and practices for the improvement of health systems and public health. The authors examine the two main macro-processes that influence development and health: the post-2015 Development Agenda and the process under way in the World Health Organization concerning research and development, intellectual property, and access to health inputs. The article concludes, first, that much remains to be done for the Agenda to truly represent a coherent and viable international political pact, and that the two macro-processes related to innovation in health need to be streamlined. But this requires democratization of participation by the main stakeholders - patients and the general population of the poorest countries - since this is the only way to overcome a "zero sum" result in the clash in the current debates among member State representatives. Resumo: O objetivo central deste texto é discutir desenvolvimento e saúde sob a ótica da influência da governança da saúde global, utilizando como traçador a dimensão das políticas de pesquisa, desenvolvimento e inovação em saúde, que se referem, de um lado, a insumos importantes para o sistema de saúde - como fármacos e medicamentos, vacinas, reativos para diagnóstico e equipamentos e, de outro, a conceitos e práticas inovadoras para o aperfeiçoamento dos sistemas de saúde e da saúde pública. Examina os dois principais macroprocessos que influenciam o desenvolvimento e a saúde: a Agenda do Desenvolvimento para o pós-2015 e o processo sobre pesquisa e desenvolvimento, propriedade intelectual e acesso a insumos em saúde em curso na Organiza

"Innovation" institutes in academic health centers: enhancing value through leadership, education, engagement, and scholarship.

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Pines, Jesse M; Farmer, Steven A; Akman, Jeffrey S

2014-09-01

In the next decade, the biggest change in medicine in the United States will be the organizational transformation of the delivery system. Organizations-including academic health centers-able to achieve better outcomes for less will be the financial winners as new payment models become more prevalent. For medical educators, the question is how to prepare the next generation of physicians for these changes. One solution is the development of new "innovation" or "value" institutes. Around the nation, many of these new institutes are focused on surmounting barriers to value-based care in academic health centers, educating faculty, house staff, and medical students in discussions of cost-conscious care. Innovation institutes can also lead discussions about how value-based care may impact education in environments where there may be less autonomy and more standardization. Quality metrics will play a larger role at academic health centers as metrics focus more on outcomes than processes. Optimizing outcomes will require that medical educators both learn and teach the principles of patient safety and quality improvement. Innovation institutes can also facilitate cross-institutional discussions to compare data on utilization and outcomes, and share best practices that maximize value. Another barrier to cost-conscious care is defensive medicine, which is highly engrained in U.S. medicine and culture. Innovation institutes may not be able to overcome all the barriers to making medical care more cost-conscious, but they can be critical in enabling academic health centers to optimize their teaching and research missions while remaining financially competitive.

Effects of Market, E-Marketing, and Technology Orientations on Innovativeness and Performance in Turkish Health Organizations.

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Mutlu, Hanifi Murat; Sürer, Atilla

2015-01-01

This article investigates the effects of strategic orientation on innovativeness and performance in health organizations in Turkey. We hypothesize that market, e-marketing, and technology orientations positively affect innovativeness and performance. Market and technology orientations are found not have a significant effect on performance, but e-marketing orientation and innovativeness have a significant and positive effect. We also investigate indirect effects on innovativeness and performance. The analyses of direct and indirect effects are an important contribution to understanding relationships among research variables.

Effects of market, e-marketing, and technology orientations on innovativeness and performance in Turkish health organizations.

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Mutlu, Hanifi Murat; Sürer, Atilla

2016-01-01

This article investigates the effects of strategic orientation on innovativeness and performance in health organizations in Turkey. We test hypotheses that market, e-marketing, and technology orientations positively affect innovativeness and performance. Market and technology orientations are found not have a significant effect on performance, but e-marketing orientation and innovativeness have a significant and positive effect. We also investigate indirect effects on innovativeness and performance. The analyses of direct and indirect effects are an important contribution to understanding relationships among research variables.

Generational, Cultural, and Linguistic Integration for Literacy Learning and Teaching in Uganda: Pedagogical Possibilities, Challenges, and Lessons from One NGO

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Ngaka, Willy; Graham, Ross; Masaazi, Fred Masagazi; Anyandru, Elly Moses

2016-01-01

This qualitative case study focuses on a volunteer-led local NGO in Uganda to examine how integrating generations, cultures, and languages is enhancing literacy learning to help ethnically and linguistically diverse rural communities survive in the prevailing globally competitive neoliberal environment. Immersing the study in the social practices…

Telehealth innovations in health education and training.

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Conde, José G; De, Suvranu; Hall, Richard W; Johansen, Edward; Meglan, Dwight; Peng, Grace C Y

2010-01-01

Telehealth applications are increasingly important in many areas of health education and training. In addition, they will play a vital role in biomedical research and research training by facilitating remote collaborations and providing access to expensive/remote instrumentation. In order to fulfill their true potential to leverage education, training, and research activities, innovations in telehealth applications should be fostered across a range of technology fronts, including online, on-demand computational models for simulation; simplified interfaces for software and hardware; software frameworks for simulations; portable telepresence systems; artificial intelligence applications to be applied when simulated human patients are not options; and the development of more simulator applications. This article presents the results of discussion on potential areas of future development, barries to overcome, and suggestions to translate the promise of telehealth applications into a transformed environment of training, education, and research in the health sciences.

Implementing Innovations in Global Women's, Children's, and Adolescents' Health: Realizing the Potential for Implementation Science.

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Peterson, Herbert B; Haidar, Joumana; Fixsen, Dean; Ramaswamy, Rohit; Weiner, Bryan J; Leatherman, Sheila

2018-03-01

The launch of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and the new Secretary General's Global Strategy for Women's, Children's, and Adolescents' Health are a window of opportunity for improving the health and well-being of women, children, and adolescents in the United States and around the world. Realizing the full potential of this historic moment will require that we improve our ability to successfully implement life-saving and life-enhancing innovations, particularly in low-resource settings. Implementation science, a new and rapidly evolving field that addresses the "how-to" component of providing sustainable quality services at scale, can make an important contribution on this front. A synthesis of the implementation science evidence indicates that three interrelated factors are required for successful, sustainable outcomes at scale: 1) effective innovations, 2) effective implementation, and 3) enabling contexts. Implementation science addresses the interaction among these factors to help make innovations more usable, to build ongoing capacity to assure the effective implementation of these innovations, and to ensure enabling contexts to sustain their full and effective use in practice. Improving access to quality services will require transforming health care systems and, therefore, much of the focus of implementation science in global health is on improving the ability of health systems to serve as enabling contexts. The field of implementation science is inherently interdisciplinary and academe will need to respond by facilitating collaboration among scientists from relevant disciplines, including evaluation, improvement, and systems sciences. Platforms and programs to facilitate collaborations among researchers, practitioners, policymakers, and funders are likewise essential.

Creating value in health by understanding and overcoming resistance to de-innovation.

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Ubel, Peter A; Asch, David A

2015-02-01

As hard as it may be for clinicians to adopt new practices, it is often harder for them to "de-innovate," or give up old practices, even when new evidence reveals that those practices offer little value. In this article we explore recent controversies over screening for breast and prostate cancer and testing for sleep disorders. We show that these controversies are not caused solely by a lack of clinical data on the harms and benefits of these tests but are also influenced by several psychological biases that make it difficult for clinicians to de-innovate. De-innovation could be fostered by making sure that advisory panels and guideline committees include experts who have competing biases; emphasizing evidence over clinical judgment; resisting "indication creep," or the premature extension of innovations into unproven areas; and encouraging clinicians to explicitly consider how their experiences bias their interpretations of clinical evidence. Project HOPE—The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.

Professional Niche Differentiation: Understanding Dai (Traditional Midwife Survival in Rural Rajasthan

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Sharmeen Azher

2017-04-01

Full Text Available Prescribing medicine, providing contraception, delivering babies – although we may turn to physicians, rural Rajasthani women turn to Barefoot Doctors out of necessity. Such care is available courtesy of the Barefoot College, a pioneering NGO that transforms the skills of the illiterate poor into local infrastructure. Barefoot Doctors are innovative because of their origins as dais (traditional midwives; once abundant across South Asia, dais are mostly extinct due to government/NGO interventions emphasizing “modernity”, like the Accredited Social Health Activist program. Why, then, have dais survived as Barefoot Doctors when they are extinct elsewhere? Ecological niche differentiation refers to when competing species successfully coexist; one species adapts to fulfill another role. Using over fifty interviews with stakeholders, I explain the persistence of Barefoot Doctors as health resources using “professional niche differentiation”. Barefoot Doctors exemplify how health infrastructure can be sustainable in resource-poor settings when created according to local needs and ideologies.

Preparing non-government organization workers to conduct health checks for people with serious mental illness in regional Australia.

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Jones, Martin; Kruger, Mellissa; Walsh, Sandra M

2016-06-01

WHAT IS KNOWN ON THE SUBJECT?: People diagnosed with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder have a life expectancy 10-15 years less than the general population. In rural and remote Australia, there is a shortage of health care professionals to provide physical health care for people living with a serious mental illness (SMI). A large proportion of the care for people living with a SMI is provided by non-government organizations (NGOs), often employing workers without formal qualifications. There has been minimal research regarding the experiences of NGO workers who have been trained to complete health checks to help people living with SMI to access primary care services. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS TO EXISTING KNOWLEDGE?: This is the first study to examine the experiences of preparing NGO workers to use the health improvement profile (HIP) to support the physical health of people with SMI. It builds on previous studies that examined the use of the HIP by trained/qualified staff. WHAT ARE THE IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE?: This study highlights that NGO employees may have an important role in helping people with a SMI to address their physical health. Engaging lay workers to use the HIP increases their awareness of the importance of providing good physical health care for people with SMI. The use of a tool, such as the HIP, prepares NGO workers to support the physical health needs and enables them to describe meaningful improvements in the health of people with a SMI. Background The life expectancy of people living with a serious mental illness (SMI) is up to 10-15 years less than the general population. They experience difficulties in accessing timely and appropriate physical health care. People with SMI living in regional Australia experience additional barriers to accessing services. This is in part due to the difficulties associated with recruiting and retaining health professionals in regional Australia. Aim To explore the regional non-government organization (NGO

Innovative financing instruments for global health 2002-15: a systematic analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Atun, Rifat; Silva, Sachin; Knaul, Felicia M

2017-07-01

Development assistance for health (DAH), the value of which peaked in 2013 and fell in 2015, is unlikely to rise substantially in the near future, increasing reliance on domestic and innovative financing sources to sustain health programmes in low-income and middle-income countries. We examined innovative financing instruments (IFIs)-financing schemes that generate and mobilise funds-to estimate the quantum of financing mobilised from 2002 to 2015. We identified ten IFIs, which mobilised US$8·9 billion (2·3% of overall DAH) in 2002-15. The funds generated by IFIs were channelled mostly through GAVI and the Global Fund, and used for programmes for new and underused vaccines, HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, and maternal and child health. Vaccination programmes received the largest amount of funding ($2·6 billion), followed by HIV/AIDS ($1080·7 million) and malaria ($1028·9 million), with no discernible funding targeted to non-communicable diseases. Copyright © 2017 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an Open Access article under the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

Science Innovation

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EPA provides innovative research activities that help transform the protection of human health and the environment with high-risk, high-reward Pathfinder Innovation Projects, the P3 student competition, and low-cost air monitoring.

Skill shortages in health: innovative solutions using vocational education and training.

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Kilpatrick, S I; Johns, S S; Millar, P; Le, Q; Routley, G

2007-01-01

This article reports findings of a project funded by the Australian National Council for Vocational Education Research. The project explores solutions to current and projected skills shortages within the health and community services sector, from a vocational education and training perspective. Its purpose is to locate, analyse and disseminate information about innovative models of health training and service delivery that have been developed in response to skill shortages. The article begins with a brief overview of Australian statistics and literature on the structure of the national health workforce and perceived skill shortages. The impact of location (state and rurality), demographics of the workforce, and other relevant factors, on health skill shortages is examined. Drawing on a synthesis of the Australian and international literature on innovative and effective models for addressing health skill shortages and nominations by key stakeholders within the health sector, over 70 models were identified. The models represent a mixture of innovative service delivery models and training solutions from Australia, as well as international examples that could be transposed to the Australian context. They include the skill ecosystem approach facilitated by the Australian National Training Authority Skill Ecosystem Project. Models were selected to represent diversity in terms of the nature of skill shortage addressed, barriers overcome in development of the model, healthcare specialisations, and different customer groups. Key barriers to the development of innovative solutions to skills shortages identified were: policy that is not sufficiently flexible to accommodate changing workplace needs; unwillingness to risk take in order to develop new models; delays in gaining endorsement/accreditation; current vocational education and training (VET) monitoring and reporting systems; issues related to working in partnership, including different cultures, ways of operating

The promise of acceptance as an NGO security management approach.

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Fast, Larissa; Freeman, Faith; O'Neill, Michael; Rowley, Elizabeth

2015-04-01

This paper explores three questions related to acceptance as a security management approach. Acceptance draws upon relationships with community members, authorities, belligerents and other stakeholders to provide consent for the presence and activities of a non-governmental organisation (NGO), thereby reducing threats from these actors. Little is documented about how NGOs gain and maintain acceptance, how they assess and monitor the presence and degree of acceptance, or how they determine whether acceptance is effective in a particular context. Based on field research conducted in April 2011 in Kenya, South Sudan and Uganda, we address each of these three issues and argue that acceptance must be actively sought as both a programme and a security management strategy. In the paper we delineate elements common to all three contexts as well as missed opportunities, which identify areas that NGOs can and should address as part of an acceptance approach. © 2015 The Author(s). Disasters © Overseas Development Institute, 2015.

A look at the ASEAN-NDI: building a regional health R&D innovation network.

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Montoya, Jaime C; Rebulanan, Carina L; Parungao, Nico Angelo C; Ramirez, Bernadette

2014-01-01

Globally, there are growing efforts to address diseases through the advancement in health research and development (R&D), strengthening of regional cooperation in science and technology (particularly on product discovery and development), and implementation of the World Health Assembly Resolution 61.21 (WHA61.21) on the Global Strategy and Plan of Action on Public Health, Innovation, and Intellectual Property (GSPA-PHI). As such, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is responding to this through the establishment of the ASEAN-Network for Drugs, Diagnostics, Vaccines, and Traditional Medicines Innovation (ASEAN-NDI). This is important in the ASEAN considering that infectious tropical diseases remain prevalent, emerging, and reemerging in the region. This paper looks into the evolution of the ASEAN-NDI from its inception in 2009, to how it is at present, and its plans to mitigate public health problems regionally and even globally.

Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa teams share early ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

2017-09-29

Sep 29, 2017 ... As the seven-year Innovating for Maternal and Child Health in Africa (IMCHA) ... delivered babies at home — far from medical care should complications arise. ... can help the healthcare system deliver service to vulnerable populations ... and La Francophonie, announced major funding for an IDRC grantee.

A Global Biomedical R&D Fund and Mechanism for Innovations of Public Health Importance

OpenAIRE

Balasegaram, Manica; Brechot, Christian; Farrar, Jeremy; Heymann, David; Ganguly, Nirmal; Khor, Martin; Levy, Yves; Matsoso, Precious; Minghui, Ren; Pecoul, Bernard; Peilong, Liu; Tanner, Marcel; Røttingen, John-Arne

2015-01-01

Anti-microbial resistance, emerging infectious diseases, and neglected diseases are all important public health concerns and priorities with serious market failures, deficits, and identified needs in biomedical innovation. It is important to reconcile, rather than fragment, the needs of these three priority areas by considering an umbrella framework for specifically financing and coordinating research and development (R&D) that delivers innovation while securing patient access. A sizeab...

The Women's Studies Center--A Women's-Led NGO Deepening Democracy in Chile: Educating Women through Personal Empowerment and Political Agency.

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King, Caroline

This paper explores how the Women's Studies Center (Centro de Estudios de la Mujer, CEM), a feminist, women-led nongovernmental organization (NGO), is contributing to socio-cultural change in Chile 11 years after the country's democratic transition. CEM merges the theoretical and the practical, and the personal and the political through education…

Engineering, global health, and inclusive innovation: focus on partnership, system strengthening, and local impact for SDGs.

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Clifford, Katie L; Zaman, Muhammad H

2016-01-01

The recent drafting of the Sustainable Development Goals challenges the research community to rethink the traditional approach to global health and provides the opportunity for science, technology, engineering, and mathematical (STEM) disciplines, particularly engineering, to demonstrate their benefit to the field. Higher education offers a platform for engineering to intersect with global health research through interdisciplinary partnerships among international universities that provide excellence in education, attract nontraditional STEM students, and foster a sense of innovation. However, a traditional lack of engineering-global health collaborations, as well as limited faculty and inadequate STEM research funding in low-income countries, has stifled progress. Still, the impact of higher education on development efforts holds great potential. This value will be realized in low-income countries through strengthening local capacity, supporting innovation through educational initiatives, and encouraging the inclusion of women and minorities in STEM programs. Current international university-level partnerships are working towards integrating engineering into global health research and strengthening STEM innovation among universities in low-income countries, but more can be done. Global health research informs sustainable development, and through integrating engineering into research efforts through university partnerships, we can accelerate progress and work towards a healthier future for all.

THE EFFECTS OF THE 2008/9 ECONOMIC RECESSION ON NGO SUSTAINABILITY AND FUNCTIONING IN THE SOUTH AFRICAN SOCIAL SERVICES, HEALTH AND EDUCATION SECTORS

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Gebreselassie-Hagos, Eyesus

2013-05-01

Full Text Available The economic crisis of 2008/2009 first emerged in the developed economies in 2008 and spilled over into developing countries and economies in transition through international financial and trade channels. This is the greatest financial crisis the world has faced since the Great Depression (Hanfstaengl, 2010; Sandra, 2008. At the height of the recession many feared that it would change into a depression. Banks were “unwilling to lend, credit spreads had widened sharply, stock markets had plunged and economies everywhere were stumbling” (Bustillo & Velloso, 2009:7. Some of the immediate effects of the economic recession on society included higher food prices and other living costs. Furthermore, corporations experienced reductions in their profit margins. It could reasonably be assumed that the NGO sector would suffer significantly as corporate donors and philanthropists typically contribute less during economic downturns.

Closing the Gap: Principal Perspectives on an Innovative School-Based Mental Health Intervention

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Blackman, Kate F.; Powers, Joelle D.; Edwards, Jeffrey D.; Wegmann, Kate M.; Lechner, Ethan; Swick, Danielle C.

2016-01-01

Mental health needs among children in the United States have significant consequences for children and their families, as well as the schools that serve them. This qualitative study evaluated the second year of an innovative school-based mental health project that created a multi-system partnership between an urban school district, a public mental…

Innovation in Graduate Education for Health Professionals in Humanitarian Emergencies.

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Evans, Dabney P; Anderson, Mark; Shahpar, Cyrus; Del Rio, Carlos; Curran, James W

2016-10-01

The objective of this report was to show how the Center for Humanitarian Emergencies (the Center) at Emory University (Atlanta, Georgia USA) has trained graduate students to respond to complex humanitarian emergencies (CHEs) through innovative educational programs, with the goal of increasing the number of trained humanitarian workers. Natural disasters are on the rise with more than twice as many occurring from 2000-2009 as there were from 1980-1989. In 2012 alone, 144 million people were affected by a natural disaster or displaced by conflict worldwide. This has created an immense need for trained humanitarian workers to respond effectively to such disasters. The Center has developed a model for educational programming that targets learners along an educational continuum ranging from the undergraduate level through continuing professional education. These programs, based in the Rollins School of Public Health (RSPH) of Emory University, include: a competency-based graduate certificate program (the Certificate) in humanitarian emergencies; a fellowship program for mid-career professionals; and funded field practica. The competency-based Certificate program began in 2010 with a cohort of 14 students. Since then, 101 students have received the Certificate with 50 more due for completion in 2016 and 2017 combined. The fellowship program for mid-career professionals has hosted four fellows from conflict-affected or resource-poor countries, who have then gone on to assume leadership positions with humanitarian organizations. From 2009-2015, the field practicum program supported 34 students in international summer practicum experiences related to emergency response or preparedness. Students have participated in summer field experiences on every continent but Australia. Together the Certificate, funded field practicum opportunities, and the fellowship comprise current efforts in providing innovative education and training for graduate and post-graduate students of public

Frantic Waiting: NGO Anti-Politics and "Timepass" for Young Syrian Refugees in Jordan

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Ann-Christin Wagner

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Drawing on Sukarieh and Tannock's political economy of youth approach, this paper explores how Syrian refugee youth is constituted in protracted displacement in Jordan. It investigates a juvenile population often overlooked in Forced Migration Studies, disenfranchised rural Syrians, who fail to develop practices of youthfulness, yet in exile are subjected to alternative productions of youth by the aid sector. Depoliticized NGO youth programming overlooks Syrians' limited access to the labour market and higher education. While educational trainings aim to produce entrepreneurial and citizen refugees, they ultimately contribute to the creation of timepass and precarious lives. This research is grounded in fourteen months of ethnographic fieldwork with Syrian refugees in a border town in northern Jordan.

A model for scale up of family health innovations in low-income and middle-income settings: a mixed methods study.

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Bradley, Elizabeth H; Curry, Leslie A; Taylor, Lauren A; Pallas, Sarah Wood; Talbert-Slagle, Kristina; Yuan, Christina; Fox, Ashley; Minhas, Dilpreet; Ciccone, Dana Karen; Berg, David; Pérez-Escamilla, Rafael

2012-01-01

Many family health innovations that have been shown to be both efficacious and cost-effective fail to scale up for widespread use particularly in low-income and middle-income countries (LMIC). Although individual cases of successful scale-up, in which widespread take up occurs, have been described, we lack an integrated and practical model of scale-up that may be applicable to a wide range of public health innovations in LMIC. To develop an integrated and practical model of scale-up that synthesises experiences of family health programmes in LMICs. We conducted a mixed methods study that included in-depth interviews with 33 key informants and a systematic review of peer-reviewed and grey literature from 11 electronic databases and 20 global health agency web sites. We included key informants and studies that reported on the scale up of several family health innovations including Depo-Provera as an example of a product innovation, exclusive breastfeeding as an example of a health behaviour innovation, community health workers (CHWs) as an example of an organisational innovation and social marketing as an example of a business model innovation. Key informants were drawn from non-governmental, government and international organisations using snowball sampling. An article was excluded if the article: did not meet the study's definition of the innovation; did not address dissemination, diffusion, scale up or sustainability of the innovation; did not address low-income or middle-income countries; was superficial in its discussion and/or did not provide empirical evidence about scale-up of the innovation; was not available online in full text; or was not available in English, French, Spanish or Portuguese, resulting in a final sample of 41 peer-reviewed articles and 30 grey literature sources. We used the constant comparative method of qualitative data analysis to extract recurrent themes from the interviews, and we integrated these themes with findings from the

Innovations in oral health: A toolkit for interprofessional education.

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Dolce, Maria C; Parker, Jessica L; Werrlein, Debra T

2017-05-01

The integration of oral health competencies into non-dental health professions curricula can serve as an effective driver for interprofessional education (IPE). The purpose of this report is to describe a replicable oral-health-driven IPE model and corresponding online toolkit, both of which were developed as part of the Innovations in Oral Health (IOH): Technology, Instruction, Practice, and Service programme at Bouvé College of Health Sciences, Northeastern University, USA. Tooth decay is a largely preventable disease that is connected to overall health and wellness, and it affects the majority of adults and a fifth of children in the United States. To prepare all health professionals to address this problem, the IOH model couples programming from the online resource Smiles for Life: A National Oral Health Curriculum with experiential learning opportunities designed for undergraduate and graduate students that include simulation-learning (technology), hands-on workshops and didactic sessions (instruction), and opportunities for both cooperative education (practice) and community-based learning (service). The IOH Toolkit provides the means for others to replicate portions of the IOH model or to establish a large-scale IPE initiative that will support the creation of an interprofessional workforce-one equipped with oral health competencies and ready for collaborative practice.

YouTube: An Innovative Learning Resource for College Health Education Courses

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Burke, Sloane C.; Snyder, Shonna L.

2008-01-01

As college health education professors attempt to engage the Web 2.0 generation of learners, use of innovative video technology resources such as YouTube can be integrated to provide relevant and targeted information to supplement college course content, create a sense of "classroom community," and enrich the learning environment for all…

Evaluation a Community Maternal Health Programme: Lessons Learnt

OpenAIRE

Sharma, Sheetal; Simkhada, Padam; Hundley, Vanora; Van Teijlingen, Edwin; Stephens, Jane; Silwal, R.C.; Angell, Catherine

2017-01-01

Abstract Using the example of a community-based health promotion intervention, this paper explores the important triangle between health promotion theory, intervention design, and evaluation research. This paper first outlines the intervention and then the mixed-method evaluation. In 2007, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) designed and implemented an intervention to improve the uptake of maternal health provision in rural Nepal. A community-based needs assessment preceded this novel healt...

Bridge over troubled waters? The state-NGO interface in governing urban environments

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Tropp, H

1998-12-31

Environmental degradation and depletion of natural resources are aggravating problems in many developing countries. A particular case about Non-Governmental Organisations` (NGOs) commitment to river water pollution in Madras (south India) is developed here, mainly with regards to the interface between the state and NGO sector. A significant reason behind environmental problems are insufficient structures of governance. An often proposed solution, by both international and local organisations and governments, is to develop a partnership between the state and local organisations and communities. The arguments here show that such increased cooperation or decentralization may not come easy and is complicated by various meanings of governance, such as discretionary state power, limited transparency of bureaucratic and political processes, red-tapism and different perceptions of causes and solutions to environmental problems 25 refs, 1 fig

Bridge over troubled waters? The state-NGO interface in governing urban environments

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Tropp, H.

1997-12-31

Environmental degradation and depletion of natural resources are aggravating problems in many developing countries. A particular case about Non-Governmental Organisations` (NGOs) commitment to river water pollution in Madras (south India) is developed here, mainly with regards to the interface between the state and NGO sector. A significant reason behind environmental problems are insufficient structures of governance. An often proposed solution, by both international and local organisations and governments, is to develop a partnership between the state and local organisations and communities. The arguments here show that such increased cooperation or decentralization may not come easy and is complicated by various meanings of governance, such as discretionary state power, limited transparency of bureaucratic and political processes, red-tapism and different perceptions of causes and solutions to environmental problems 25 refs, 1 fig

Transmedia storytelling in the NGO communication. Sí me importa by Oxfam Intermón

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Laura MARTÍNEZ VALERO

2016-12-01

Full Text Available Traditionally, transmedia storytelling has been used for spreading fiction narrative worlds, such as films and TV series. However, it was a matter of time that its ability for explaining the reality was discovered and utilised by social organizations to explain their causes and to reach new audiences. Moreover, the new mobile environment challenges the creativity of the organizations to develop products that make use of this new form of consumption. The Sí me importa campaign, a transmedia project of the Spanish NGO Oxfam Intermón, reclaimed the importance of the in-ternational cooperation through social networks, comic, theatre, contemporary art and cinema.

Non-Governmental Organization (NGO Libraries for The Visually Impaired in Nigeria: Alternative Format Use and Perception of Information Services

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Adetoro, 'Niran

2015-03-01

Full Text Available Nigeria's non-government organization (NGO libraries for the visually impaired has over the years been at the forefront of information services provision to persons with visual impairment. This study adopted a survey research design to investigate use of alternative formats and perceptions of information services to the visually impaired, focusing on two purposively chosen NGO libraries for the visually impaired in Nigeria. Using a complete enumeration approach, data were gathered from 180 users of the libraries through the use of a structured questionnaire with a reliability score (${\\alpha}=0.74$. Data from 112 (62.2% of the 180 administered copies of a questionnaire that were retrieved were analysed. The study found that Braille materials had a high level of utilization ($\\bar{x}=4.46$ and were the most frequently utilized (90.9%. Perception of information services by the visually impaired was positive while use of alternative formats was significantly and positively related to users' perception of information services (r = .041; p < 0.05. The study recommends improved transcription and investment in alternative formats and in e-resources. It also recommends collaborations to widen access as well as constant evaluation of services.

Multilevel (mental) health promotion as social innovation in peripheral areas of Denmark

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Delica, Kristian Nagel

, bureaucratic level over the front line welfare professionals’ practices to the young mother’s experiences. The paper aligns a multilevel approach to theories of social innovation. This forms a fundament for discussing ‘horizontal’ and ‘vertical’ multilevel health promotion and analysing the interwoven...

Patient-Driven Innovation for Mobile Mental Health Technology: Case Report of Symptom Tracking in Schizophrenia.

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Torous, John; Roux, Spencer

2017-07-06

This patient perspective piece presents an important case at the intersection of mobile health technology, mental health, and innovation. The potential of digital technologies to advance mental health is well known, although the challenges are being increasingly recognized. Making mobile health work for mental health will require broad collaborations. We already know that those who experience mental illness are excited by the potential technology, with many actively engaged in research, fundraising, advocacy, and entrepreneurial ventures. But we don't always hear their voice as often as others. There is a clear advantage for their voice to be heard: so we can all learn from their experiences at the direct intersection of mental health and technology innovation. The case is cowritten with an individual with schizophrenia, who openly shares his name and personal experience with mental health technology in order to educate and inspire others. This paper is the first in JMIR Mental Health's patient perspective series, and we welcome future contributions from those with lived experience. ©John Torous, Spencer Roux. Originally published in JMIR Mental Health (http://mental.jmir.org), 06.07.2017.

Using innovative instructional technology to meet training needs in public health: a design process.

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Millery, Mari; Hall, Michelle; Eisman, Joanna; Murrman, Marita

2014-03-01

Technology and distance learning can potentially enhance the efficient and effective delivery of continuing education to the public health workforce. Public Health Training Centers collaborate with instructional technology designers to develop innovative, competency-based online learning experiences that meet pressing training needs and promote best practices. We describe one Public Health Training Center's online learning module design process, which consists of five steps: (1) identify training needs and priority competencies; (2) define learning objectives and identify educational challenges; (3) pose hypotheses and explore innovative, technology-based solutions; (4) develop and deploy the educational experience; and (5) evaluate feedback and outcomes to inform continued cycles of revision and improvement. Examples illustrate the model's application. These steps are discussed within the context of design practices in the fields of education, engineering, and public health. They incorporate key strategies from across these fields, including principles of programmatic design familiar to public health professionals, such as backward design. The instructional technology design process we describe provides a structure for the creativity, collaboration, and systematic strategies needed to develop online learning products that address critical training needs for the public health workforce.

Engineering, global health, and inclusive innovation: focus on partnership, system strengthening, and local impact for SDGs

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Katie L. Clifford

2016-01-01

Full Text Available The recent drafting of the Sustainable Development Goals challenges the research community to rethink the traditional approach to global health and provides the opportunity for science, technology, engineering, and mathematical (STEM disciplines, particularly engineering, to demonstrate their benefit to the field. Higher education offers a platform for engineering to intersect with global health research through interdisciplinary partnerships among international universities that provide excellence in education, attract nontraditional STEM students, and foster a sense of innovation. However, a traditional lack of engineering–global health collaborations, as well as limited faculty and inadequate STEM research funding in low-income countries, has stifled progress. Still, the impact of higher education on development efforts holds great potential. This value will be realized in low-income countries through strengthening local capacity, supporting innovation through educational initiatives, and encouraging the inclusion of women and minorities in STEM programs. Current international university-level partnerships are working towards integrating engineering into global health research and strengthening STEM innovation among universities in low-income countries, but more can be done. Global health research informs sustainable development, and through integrating engineering into research efforts through university partnerships, we can accelerate progress and work towards a healthier future for all.

Fluxos informacionais para o monitoramento da Convenção dos Direitos da Criança: a atuação da rede NGO Group for CRCInformation follow and the monitoring process of the convention on the rights of child by NGO Group for CRC network

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maria Guiomar da Cunha Frota

2010-05-01

Full Text Available O presente artigo apresenta os resultados de uma pesquisa que investiga uma rede social internacional denominada NGO Group for CRC. A rede é composta por cerca de noventa organizações não governamentais e foi criada para monitorar a implementação da Convenção dos Direitos da Criança (CRC. A CRC é o principal documento jurídico relativo aos direitos da criança, tendo sido aprovada pela totalidade dos países pertencentes à ONU, com exceção dos EUA. Pretende-se especificamente analisar o fluxo informacional que se estabelece em meio à rede, seus membros e as organizações que a ela se associam. As questões investigadas são as seguintes: 1 Em que medida o fluxo informacional torna-se parte intrínseca da estrutura em rede? 2 Como os fluxos informacionais se configuram e de que modo são apropriados e veiculados pela rede NGO Group for CRC no curso do monitoramento da implementação da Convenção dos Direitos da Criança?This paper presents the research results about the social network NGO Group for CRC which is an articulation of non governmental organizations related to children's rights. This paper analyzes the information flow inside the network, among its members and among the network organizations. The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC was approved in 1989 by the General Assembly of the United Nations, being ratified in its totality by the countries members, with the exception of the United States of America. The investigated questions are: 1 How is the role of the information flow in the network structure? 2 How is the information flow configured to support the implementation monitoring process of the Convention on the Rights of the Child?

Burden of disease, research funding and innovation in the UK: Do new health technologies reflect research inputs and need?

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Ward, Derek; Martino, Orsolina; Packer, Claire; Simpson, Sue; Stevens, Andrew

2013-04-01

New and emerging health technologies (innovation outputs) do not always reflect conditions representing the greatest disease burden. We examine the role of research and development (R&D) funding in this relationship, considering whether areas with fewer innovative outputs receive an appropriate share of funding relative to their disease burden. We report a retrospective observational study, comparing burden of disease with R&D funding and innovation output. UK disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) and deaths came from the World Health Organization (WHO) 2004 Global Burden of Disease estimates; funding estimates from the UK Clinical Research Collaboration's 2006 Health Research Analysis; and innovation output was estimated by the number of new and emerging technologies reported by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Horizon Scanning Centre between 2000 and 2009. Disease areas representing the biggest burden were generally associated with the most funding and innovation output; cancer, neuropsychiatric conditions and cardiovascular disease together comprised approximately two-thirds of DALYs, funding and reported technologies. Compared with DALYs, funding and technologies were disproportionately high for cancer, and technologies alone were disproportionately high for musculoskeletal conditions and endocrine/metabolic diseases. Neuropsychiatric conditions had comparatively few technologies compared to both DALYs and funding. The relationship between DALYs and innovation output appeared to be mediated by R&D funding. The relationship between burden of disease and new and emerging health technologies for different disease areas is partly dependent on the associated level of R&D funding (input). Discrepancies among key groups may reflect differential focus of research funding across disease areas. © The Author(s) 2013 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav.

A Dutch and American commentary on IT in health care: roundtable discussions on IT and innovations in health care.

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Savage, Grant T; van der Reis, Leo

2012-01-01

This chapter reports on experts' perspectives on health information technology (HIT) and how it may be used to improve health care quality and to lower health care costs. Two roundtables were convened that focused on how to best use HIT to improve the quality of health care while ensuring it is accessible and affordable. Participants drew upon lessons learned in the Netherlands, the United States, and other countries. The first roundtable focused on the use of (1) electronic health records (EHRs) by health care providers, (2) cloud computing for EHRs and health portals for consumers, and (3) data registries and networks for public health surveillance. The second roundtable highlighted (1) the rapid growth of personalized medicine, (2) the corresponding growth and sophistication of bioinformatics and analytics, (3) the increasing presence of mobile HIT, and (4) the disruptive changes in the institutional structures of biomedical research and development. Governmental sponsorship of small pilot projects to solve practicable health system problems would encourage HIT innovation among key stakeholders. However, large-scale HIT solutions developed through small pilot projects--should be pursued through public-private partnerships. At the same time, governments should speed up legislative and regulatory procedures to encourage adoption of cost-effective HIT innovations. Mobile HIT and social media are capable of fostering disease prevention and encouraging personal responsibility for improving or stabilizing chronic diseases. Both health services researchers and policy makers should find this chapter of value since it highlights trends in HIT and addresses how health care quality may be improved while costs are contained.

Innovative health service delivery models in low and middle income countries - what can we learn from the private sector?

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Bhattacharyya, Onil; Khor, Sara; McGahan, Anita; Dunne, David; Daar, Abdallah S; Singer, Peter A

2010-07-15

The poor in low and middle income countries have limited access to health services due to limited purchasing power, residence in underserved areas, and inadequate health literacy. This produces significant gaps in health care delivery among a population that has a disproportionately large burden of disease. They frequently use the private health sector, due to perceived or actual gaps in public services. A subset of private health organizations, some called social enterprises, have developed novel approaches to increase the availability, affordability and quality of health care services to the poor through innovative health service delivery models. This study aims to characterize these models and identify areas of innovation that have led to effective provision of care for the poor. An environmental scan of peer-reviewed and grey literature was conducted to select exemplars of innovation. A case series of organizations was then purposively sampled to maximize variation. These cases were examined using content analysis and constant comparison to characterize their strategies, focusing on business processes. After an initial sample of 46 studies, 10 case studies of exemplars were developed spanning different geography, disease areas and health service delivery models. These ten organizations had innovations in their marketing, financing, and operating strategies. These included approaches such a social marketing, cross-subsidy, high-volume, low cost models, and process reengineering. They tended to have a narrow clinical focus, which facilitates standardizing processes of care, and experimentation with novel delivery models. Despite being well-known, information on the social impact of these organizations was variable, with more data on availability and affordability and less on quality of care. These private sector organizations demonstrate a range of innovations in health service delivery that have the potential to better serve the poor's health needs and be

Innovative health service delivery models in low and middle income countries - what can we learn from the private sector?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Daar Abdallah S

2010-07-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background The poor in low and middle income countries have limited access to health services due to limited purchasing power, residence in underserved areas, and inadequate health literacy. This produces significant gaps in health care delivery among a population that has a disproportionately large burden of disease. They frequently use the private health sector, due to perceived or actual gaps in public services. A subset of private health organizations, some called social enterprises, have developed novel approaches to increase the availability, affordability and quality of health care services to the poor through innovative health service delivery models. This study aims to characterize these models and identify areas of innovation that have led to effective provision of care for the poor. Methods An environmental scan of peer-reviewed and grey literature was conducted to select exemplars of innovation. A case series of organizations was then purposively sampled to maximize variation. These cases were examined using content analysis and constant comparison to characterize their strategies, focusing on business processes. Results After an initial sample of 46 studies, 10 case studies of exemplars were developed spanning different geography, disease areas and health service delivery models. These ten organizations had innovations in their marketing, financing, and operating strategies. These included approaches such a social marketing, cross-subsidy, high-volume, low cost models, and process reengineering. They tended to have a narrow clinical focus, which facilitates standardizing processes of care, and experimentation with novel delivery models. Despite being well-known, information on the social impact of these organizations was variable, with more data on availability and affordability and less on quality of care. Conclusions These private sector organizations demonstrate a range of innovations in health service delivery that have

Systematic Medical Appraisal, Referral and Treatment (SMART) Mental Health Programme for providing innovative mental health care in rural communities in India

OpenAIRE

Maulik, P. K.; Devarapalli, S.; Kallakuri, S.; Praveen, D.; Jha, V.; Patel, A.

2015-01-01

Background. India has few mental health professionals to treat the large number of people suffering from mental disorders. Rural areas are particularly disadvantaged due to lack of trained health workers. Ways to improve care could be by training village health workers in basic mental health care, and by using innovative methods of service delivery. The ongoing Systematic Medical Appraisal, Referral and Treatment Mental Health Programme will assess the acceptability, feasibility and prelimina...

Aesthetic, emotion and empathetic imagination: beyond innovation to creativity in the health and social care workforce.

Science.gov (United States)

Munt, Deborah; Hargreaves, Janet

2009-12-01

The Creativity in Health and Care Workshops programme was a series of investigative workshops aimed at interrogating the subject of creativity with an over-arching objective of extending the understanding of the problems and possibilities of applying creativity within the health and care sector workforce. Included in the workshops was a concept analysis, which attempted to gain clearer understanding of creativity and innovation within this context. The analysis led to emergent theory regarding the central importance of aesthetics, emotion and empathetic imagination to the generation of creative and innovative outcomes that have the capacity to promote wellbeing in the health and social care workforce. Drawing on expertise in the field, this paper outlines the concept analysis and subsequent reflection.

[Boundaries of the autonomy of local health administration: innovation, creativity and evidence-based decision-making].

Science.gov (United States)

Silva, Silvio Fernandes da; Souza, Nathan Mendes; Barreto, Jorge Otávio Maia

2014-11-01

The scope of this article was to identify the boundaries of the autonomy of local administration in the context of the federal pact in the Brazilian Unified Health System and the importance and potential for promoting innovation, creativity and evidence-based decision-making by local governments. The methodology used was to ask questions that favored dialogue with the specific literature to identify the influence of centrally-formulated policies in spaces of local autonomy and then to identify strategies to foster innovation, creativity and the systematic use of evidence-based research in health policy implementation. A gradual reduction in municipal decision-making autonomy was detected due to increased financial commitment of the municipalities resulting from responsibilities assumed, albeit with the possibility of reverting this trend in the more recent context. Some determinants and challenges for the dissemination of innovative practices were analyzed and some relevant national and international experiences in this respect were presented. The conclusion drawn is that it is possible to make local decision-making more effective provided that initiatives are consolidated to promote this culture and the formulation and implementation of evidence-based health policies.

Assessing human health risks from pesticide use in conventional and innovative cropping systems with the BROWSE model.

Science.gov (United States)

Lammoglia, Sabine-Karen; Kennedy, Marc C; Barriuso, Enrique; Alletto, Lionel; Justes, Eric; Munier-Jolain, Nicolas; Mamy, Laure

2017-08-01

Reducing the risks and impacts of pesticide use on human health and on the environment is one of the objectives of the European Commission Directive 2009/128/EC in the quest for a sustainable use of pesticides. This Directive, developed through European national plans such as Ecophyto plan in France, promotes the introduction of innovative cropping systems relying, for example, on integrated pest management. Risk assessment for human health of the overall pesticide use in these innovative systems is required before the introduction of those systems to avoid that an innovation becomes a new problem. The objectives of this work were to assess and to compare (1) the human exposure to pesticides used in conventional and innovative cropping systems designed to reduce pesticide needs, and (2) the corresponding risks for human health. Humans (operator and residents) exposure to pesticides and risks for human health were assessed for each pesticide with the BROWSE model. Then, a method was proposed to represent the overall risk due to all pesticides used in one system. This study considers 3 conventional and 9 associated innovative cropping systems, and 116 plant protection products containing 89 different active substances (i.e. pesticides). The modelling results obtained with BROWSE showed that innovative cropping systems such as low input or no herbicide systems would reduce the risk for human health in comparison to the corresponding conventional cropping systems. On the contrary, BROWSE showed that conservation tillage system would lead to unacceptable risks in the conditions of our study, because of a high number of pesticide applications, and especially of some herbicides. For residents, the dermal absorption was the main exposure route while ingestion was found to be negligible. For operators, inhalation was also a predominant route of exposure. In general, human exposure to pesticides and human health risks were found to be correlated to the treatment frequency

Biobanks in Oral Health: Promises and Implications of Post-Neoliberal Science and Innovation

Science.gov (United States)

Dove, Edward S.; Chiappetta, Margaret; Gürsoy, Ulvi K.

2016-01-01

Abstract While biobanks are established explicitly as scientific infrastructures, they are de facto political-economic ones too. Many biobanks, particularly population-based biobanks, are framed under the rubric of the bio-economy as national political-economic assets that benefit domestic business, while national populations are framed as a natural resource whose genomics, proteomics, and related biological material and national health data can be exploited. We outline how many biobanks epitomize this ‘neoliberal’ form of science and innovation in which research is driven by market priorities (e.g., profit, shareholder value) underpinned by state or government policies. As both scientific and political-economic infrastructures, biobanks end up entangled in an array of problems associated with market-driven science and innovation. These include: profit trumping other considerations; rentiership trumping entrepreneurship; and applied research trumping basic research. As a result, there has been a push behind new forms of ‘post-neoliberal’ science and innovation strategies based on principles of openness and collaboration, especially in relation to biobanks. The proliferation of biobanks and the putative transition in both scientific practice and political economy from neoliberalism to post-neoliberalism demands fresh social scientific analyses, particularly as biobanks become further established in fields such as oral health and personalized dentistry. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first analysis of biobanks with a view to what we can anticipate from biobanks and distributed post-genomics global science in the current era of oral health biomarkers. PMID:26584410

Biobanks in Oral Health: Promises and Implications of Post-Neoliberal Science and Innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Birch, Kean; Dove, Edward S; Chiappetta, Margaret; Gürsoy, Ulvi K

2016-01-01

While biobanks are established explicitly as scientific infrastructures, they are de facto political-economic ones too. Many biobanks, particularly population-based biobanks, are framed under the rubric of the bio-economy as national political-economic assets that benefit domestic business, while national populations are framed as a natural resource whose genomics, proteomics, and related biological material and national health data can be exploited. We outline how many biobanks epitomize this 'neoliberal' form of science and innovation in which research is driven by market priorities (e.g., profit, shareholder value) underpinned by state or government policies. As both scientific and political-economic infrastructures, biobanks end up entangled in an array of problems associated with market-driven science and innovation. These include: profit trumping other considerations; rentiership trumping entrepreneurship; and applied research trumping basic research. As a result, there has been a push behind new forms of 'post-neoliberal' science and innovation strategies based on principles of openness and collaboration, especially in relation to biobanks. The proliferation of biobanks and the putative transition in both scientific practice and political economy from neoliberalism to post-neoliberalism demands fresh social scientific analyses, particularly as biobanks become further established in fields such as oral health and personalized dentistry. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first analysis of biobanks with a view to what we can anticipate from biobanks and distributed post-genomics global science in the current era of oral health biomarkers.

Electronic health record innovations: Helping physicians - One less click at a time.

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Guo, Uta; Chen, Lu; Mehta, Parag H

2017-09-01

Physician burnout is becoming an epidemic, due to the pressures of being productive, an imperfect electronic health record (EHR) system, and limited face-to-face time with patients. Poor usability in EHR-user interface can force users to go through more steps (i.e. more clicks on the computer) in accomplishing a task. This increased 'click burden' is a source of frustration for physicians. In the light of increased click burden and time due to meaningful use requirements, there is a need to improve the physician's experience by creating innovations in EHR. This case study describes an attempt by physicians at NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital to enhance the EHR experience with more efficient methods of documentation, chart review, ordering and patient safety. The EHR innovations trialled in this study were: a mobile documentation application; abnormal test results auto-populated into an EHR patient summary; physician alerts to reduce inappropriate test ordering; and a system of safety alerts on a dashboard. These innovations led to decreased click burden and allowed physicians to spend less time on the computer and more time with patients. Physician-driven changes to EHR systems have the potential to streamline virtual workflows and the management of health information and to improve patient safety, reduce physician burnout and increase physician job satisfaction.

The Surgery Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Program (SIEDP): An Experiential Learning Program for Surgery Faculty to Ideate and Implement Innovations in Health care.

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Servoss, Jonathan; Chang, Connie; Olson, David; Ward, Kevin R; Mulholland, Michael W; Cohen, Mark S

2017-10-05

Surgeons are continually engaged in the incorporation of new technologies in their practice. In the operating room and beyond, they combine technical skill with creative problem solving to improve tools and techniques for patient care, making them natural innovators. However, despite their innovative tendencies, education on entrepreneurship and commercialization is severely lacking. Moreover, with increasing pressure to meet productivity metrics, their availability to learn the complexities of commercialization is limited. To address these challenges, we designed the Surgery Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Program (SIEDP) with the objective to advance faculty innovations, develop new departmental innovation initiatives, and improve faculty education in the area of innovation, entrepreneurship, and commercialization. The SIEDP is a first-of-its-kind experiential learning program specifically designed for busy clinical and research faculty in a major academic surgery department. Participants ideated and formed teams around health care innovations as they progressed through a 9-month curriculum of expert guest lectures and interactive workshops. A postprogram evaluation and outcome tracking method was used to evaluate attainment of educational objectives and project development milestones. The Department of Surgery, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Eleven surgery faculty of varying academic rank and surgical subspecialties. The program generated 2 faculty startup companies, 1 departmental commercial product, 3 patent disclosures, and 3 innovations that received additional funding. All participants in the program reported a significant increase in their understanding of innovation and entrepreneurship and that participation was a worthwhile faculty development activity. Despite the various challenges and time constraints of surgical practices, programs like SIEDP can educate surgeons and other academicians on innovation

Social marketing meets health literacy: Innovative improvement of health care providers’ comfort with patient interaction

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Primack, Brian A.; Bui, Thuy; Fertman, Carl I.

2010-01-01

Objective It is essential to train health care providers to deliver care sensitive to the needs of diverse individuals with varying degrees of health literacy. We aimed to evaluate an innovative, theory-based, educational intervention involving social marketing and health literacy. Methods In 2006 at a large medical school, all first-year students were exposed to the intervention. They completed pre- and post-test anonymous surveys including demographic data, covariates, and key outcome variables. Paired t-tests and multiple linear regression were used to evaluate the intervention and to determine independent associations among the key outcome variables. Results Post-intervention scores were significantly higher than pre-intervention scores for social marketing (3.31 versus 1.90, p marketing and health literacy can improve skills that improve medical students’ comfort with patients of diverse backgrounds. Practice implications Health care providers can be taught educational principles and skills involved in developing effective patient education materials. These skills may improve providers’ comfort with direct patient interaction. PMID:17418522

Increased fairness in priority setting processes within the health sector

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zulu, Joseph M.; Michelo, Charles; Msoni, Carol

2014-01-01

administration, in non-governmental organizations (NGO) and in health facilities. RESULTS: During the baseline study, concepts of legitimacy and fairness in PS processes were found to be grounded in local values of equity and impartiality. Government and other organizational strategies strongly supported...

'Scaling-up is a craft not a science': Catalysing scale-up of health innovations in Ethiopia, India and Nigeria.

Science.gov (United States)

Spicer, Neil; Bhattacharya, Dipankar; Dimka, Ritgak; Fanta, Feleke; Mangham-Jefferies, Lindsay; Schellenberg, Joanna; Tamire-Woldemariam, Addis; Walt, Gill; Wickremasinghe, Deepthi

2014-11-01

Donors and other development partners commonly introduce innovative practices and technologies to improve health in low and middle income countries. Yet many innovations that are effective in improving health and survival are slow to be translated into policy and implemented at scale. Understanding the factors influencing scale-up is important. We conducted a qualitative study involving 150 semi-structured interviews with government, development partners, civil society organisations and externally funded implementers, professional associations and academic institutions in 2012/13 to explore scale-up of innovative interventions targeting mothers and newborns in Ethiopia, the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and the six states of northeast Nigeria, which are settings with high burdens of maternal and neonatal mortality. Interviews were analysed using a common analytic framework developed for cross-country comparison and themes were coded using Nvivo. We found that programme implementers across the three settings require multiple steps to catalyse scale-up. Advocating for government to adopt and finance health innovations requires: designing scalable innovations; embedding scale-up in programme design and allocating time and resources; building implementer capacity to catalyse scale-up; adopting effective approaches to advocacy; presenting strong evidence to support government decision making; involving government in programme design; invoking policy champions and networks; strengthening harmonisation among external programmes; aligning innovations with health systems and priorities. Other steps include: supporting government to develop policies and programmes and strengthening health systems and staff; promoting community uptake by involving media, community leaders, mobilisation teams and role models. We conclude that scale-up has no magic bullet solution - implementers must embrace multiple activities, and require substantial support from donors and governments in

Public health policy decisions on medical innovations: what role can early economic evaluation play?

Science.gov (United States)

Hartz, Susanne; John, Jürgen

2009-02-01

Our contribution aims to explore the different ways in which early economic data can inform public health policy decisions on new medical technologies. A literature research was conducted to detect methodological contributions covering the health policy perspective. Early economic data on new technologies can support public health policy decisions in several ways. Embedded in horizon scanning and HTA activities, it adds to monitoring and assessment of innovations. It can play a role in the control of technology diffusion by informing coverage and reimbursement decisions as well as the direct public promotion of healthcare technologies, leading to increased efficiency. Major problems include the uncertainty related to economic data at early stages as well as the timing of the evaluation of an innovation. Decision-makers can benefit from the information supplied by early economic data, but the actual use in practice is difficult to determine. Further empirical evidence should be gathered, while the use could be promoted by further standardization.

Achieving Health SDG 3 in Africa through NGO Capacity Building - Insights from the Gates Foundation Investment in Partnership in Advocacy for Child and Family Health (PACFaH) Project.

Science.gov (United States)

Walker, Judith-Ann

2016-09-01

As global impact investors gear up to support roll out of the Sustainable Development Goals in the developing world, African CSOs are urged to ensure that governments shift health funding sources away from aid and loans to innovative domestic funding sources which prioritize health. To do so, African CSOs require support to build their capacity for policy and budget advocacy. Governments and development partners have failed to invest in long term capacity building projects for indigenous NGOs and instead support INGOs to push the health advocacy agenda forward. In Nigeria, the Gates foundation has risen to the challenge of building capacity of indigenous NGOs for social accountability in child and family health. The 3 year pilot project - Partnership for Advocacy in Child and Family Health Project (PACFaH) mainstreams capacity building as an effective implementation strategy for 8 indigenous NGOs to deliver on - policy; budgetary; legislative; and administrative advocacy in four issue areas: 1) family planning; 2) nutrition; 3) routine immunization; and 4) reduction of under-5 deaths from diarrhea and pneumonia. This paper documents the achievements of the eight advocacy NGOs in PACFaH, at midterm and notes that while there have been challenges, working through capacity building as an implementation strategy has enabled the local groups in the delivery of evidence based advocacy.

Creating a climate that catalyses healthcare innovation in the United Kingdom - learning lessons from international innovators.

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Cresswell, Kathrin; Cunningham-Burley, Sarah; Sheikh, Aziz

2017-01-25

The United Kingdom (UK) lags behind other high-income countries in relation to technological innovation in healthcare. In order to inform UK strategy on how to catalyse innovation, we sought to understand what national strategies can help to promote a climate for innovation in healthcare settings by extracting lessons for the UK from international innovators. We undertook a series of qualitative semi-structured interviews with senior international innovators from a range of health related policy, care/service delivery, commercial and academic backgrounds. Thematic analysis helped to explore how different stakeholder groups could facilitate/inhibit innovation at individual, organisational, and wider societal levels. We conducted 14 interviews and found that a conducive climate for healthcare innovation comprised of national/regional strategies stimulating commercial competition, promoting public/private relationships, and providing central direction (e.g. incentives for adoption and regulation through standards) without being restrictive. Organisational attitudes with a willingness to experiment and to take risks were also seen as important, but a bottom-up approach to innovation, based on the identification of clinical need, was seen as a crucial first step to construct relevant national policies.  There is now a need to create mechanisms through which frontline National Health Service staff in relation can raise ideas/concerns and suggest opportunities for improvement, and then build national innovation environments that seek to address these needs. This should be accompanied by creating competitive health technology markets to stimulate a commercial environment that attracts high-quality health information technology experts and innovators working in partnership with staff and patients.

Improving lives using multidisciplinary education: partnering to benefit community, innovation, health, and technology.

Science.gov (United States)

McClelland, Molly; Kleinke, Darrell

2013-07-01

University students are trained in specific disciplines, which can benefit disabled individuals in a variety of ways, including education, health promotion, assistive technologies, logistics, or design improvement. However, collaboration with other disciplines can have a greater impact on improving the health of disabled individuals than can training in one discipline alone. The University of Detroit Mercy Colleges of Engineering and Nursing have partnered to develop and provide assistive devices to disabled individuals while teaching innovation, technology, and collaboration to students. After 4 years of developing and implementing our multidisciplinary program, numerous unique and helpful assistive devices have been designed, created, and delivered to individuals in our community. More nursing schools should initiate multidisciplinary programs to train and prepare students for workplaces where such innovative, collaborative skills are increasingly sought. Nurses need to be at the forefront of such collaborative work. Copyright 2013, SLACK Incorporated.

Sensitive innovation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Søndergaard, Katia Dupret

Present paper discusses sources of innovation as heterogenic and at times intangible processes. Arguing for heterogeneity and intangibility as sources of innovation originates from a theoretical reading in STS and ANT studies (e.g. Callon 1986, Latour 1996, Mol 2002, Pols 2005) and from field work...... in the area of mental health (Dupret Søndergaard 2009, 2010). The concept of sensitive innovation is developed to capture and conceptualise exactly those heterogenic and intangible processes. Sensitive innovation is therefore primarily a way to understand innovative sources that can be......, but are not necessarily, recognized and acknowledged as such in the outer organisational culture or by management. The added value that qualifies these processes to be defined as “innovative” are thus argued for along different lines than in more traditional innovation studies (e.g. studies that build on the classic...

Applying social innovation theory to examine how community co-designed health services develop: using a case study approach and mixed methods.

Science.gov (United States)

Farmer, Jane; Carlisle, Karen; Dickson-Swift, Virginia; Teasdale, Simon; Kenny, Amanda; Taylor, Judy; Croker, Felicity; Marini, Karen; Gussy, Mark

2018-01-31

Citizen participation in health service co-production is increasingly enacted. A reason for engaging community members is to co-design services that are locally-appropriate and harness local assets. To date, much literature examines processes of involving participants, with little consideration of innovative services are designed, how innovations emerge, develop and whether they sustain or diffuse. This paper addresses this gap by examining co-designed initiatives through the lens of social innovation - a conceptualisation more attuned to analysing grassroots innovation than common health services research approaches considering top-down, technical innovations. This paper considers whether social innovation is a useful frame for examining co-designed services. Eighty-eight volunteer community-based participants from six rural Australian communities were engaged using the same, tested co-design framework for a 12-month design and then 12-month implementation phase, in 24 workshops (2014-16). Mixed, qualitative data were collected and used to formulate five case studies of community co-designed innovations. A social innovation theory, derived from literature, was applied as an analytical frame to examine co-design cases at 3 stages: innovation growth, development and sustainability/diffusion. Social innovation theory was found relevant in examining and understanding what occurred at each stage of innovation development. Innovations themselves were all adaptations of existing ideas. They emerged due to local participants combining knowledge from local context, own experiences and exemplars. External facilitation brought resources together. The project provided a protective niche in which pilot innovations developed, but they needed support from managers and/or policymakers to be implemented; and to be compatible with existing health system practices. For innovations to move to sustainability/diffusion required political relationships. Challenging existing practice

Differentiating innovation priorities among stakeholder in hospital care.

Science.gov (United States)

Lambooij, Mattijs S; Hummel, Marjan J

2013-08-16

Decisions to adopt a particular innovation may vary between stakeholders because individual stakeholders may disagree on the costs and benefits involved. This may translate to disagreement between stakeholders on priorities in the implementation process, possibly explaining the slow diffusion of innovations in health care. In this study, we explore the differences in stakeholder preferences for innovations, and quantify the difference in stakeholder priorities regarding costs and benefits. The decision support technique called the analytic hierarchy process was used to quantify the preferences of stakeholders for nine information technology (IT) innovations in hospital care. The selection of the innovations was based on a literature review and expert judgments. Decision criteria related to the costs and benefits of the innovations were defined. These criteria were improvement in efficiency, health gains, satisfaction with care process, and investments required. Stakeholders judged the importance of the decision criteria and subsequently prioritized the selected IT innovations according to their expectations of how well the innovations would perform for these decision criteria. The stakeholder groups (patients, nurses, physicians, managers, health care insurers, and policy makers) had different preference structures for the innovations selected. For instance, self-tests were one of the innovations most preferred by health care insurers and managers, owing to their expected positive impacts on efficiency and health gains. However, physicians, nurses and patients strongly doubted the health gains of self-tests, and accordingly ranked self-tests as the least-preferred innovation. The various stakeholder groups had different expectations of the value of the nine IT innovations. The differences are likely due to perceived stakeholder benefits of each innovation, and less to the costs to individual stakeholder groups. This study provides a first exploratory quantitative

Data-Driven Diffusion Of Innovations: Successes And Challenges In 3 Large-Scale Innovative Delivery Models.

Science.gov (United States)

Dorr, David A; Cohen, Deborah J; Adler-Milstein, Julia

2018-02-01

Failed diffusion of innovations may be linked to an inability to use and apply data, information, and knowledge to change perceptions of current practice and motivate change. Using qualitative and quantitative data from three large-scale health care delivery innovations-accountable care organizations, advanced primary care practice, and EvidenceNOW-we assessed where data-driven innovation is occurring and where challenges lie. We found that implementation of some technological components of innovation (for example, electronic health records) has occurred among health care organizations, but core functions needed to use data to drive innovation are lacking. Deficits include the inability to extract and aggregate data from the records; gaps in sharing data; and challenges in adopting advanced data functions, particularly those related to timely reporting of performance data. The unexpectedly high costs and burden incurred during implementation of the innovations have limited organizations' ability to address these and other deficits. Solutions that could help speed progress in data-driven innovation include facilitating peer-to-peer technical assistance, providing tailored feedback reports to providers from data aggregators, and using practice facilitators skilled in using data technology for quality improvement to help practices transform. Policy efforts that promote these solutions may enable more rapid uptake of and successful participation in innovative delivery system reforms.

Legal and Regulatory Barriers to Reverse Innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Rowthorn, Virginia; Plum, Alexander J; Zervos, John

Reverse innovation, or the importation of new, affordable, and efficacious models to high-income countries from the developing world, has emerged as a way to improve the health care system in the United States. Reverse innovation has been identified as a key emerging trend in global health systems in part because low-resourced settings are particularly good laboratories for low-cost/high-impact innovations that are developed out of necessity. A difficult question receiving scant attention is that of legal and regulatory barriers. The objective of this paper is to understand and elucidate the legal barriers faced by innovators bringing health interventions to the United States. Semistructured qualitative interviews were conducted with 9 key informants who have directly participated in the introduction of global health care approaches to the United States health system. A purposive sampling scheme was employed to identify participants. Phone interviews were conducted over one week in July 2016 with each participant and lasted an average of 35 minutes each. Purely legal barriers included questions surrounding tort liability, standard of care, and concerns around patient-administered self-care. Regulatory burdens included issues of international medical licensure, reimbursement, and task shifting and scope of work challenges among nonprofessionals (e.g. community health workers). Finally, perceived (i.e. not realized or experienced) legal and regulatory barriers to innovative modalities served as disincentives to bringing products or services developed outside of the United States to the United States market. Conflicting interests within the health care system, safety concerns, and little value placed on low-cost interventions inhibit innovation. Legal and regulatory barriers rank among, and contribute to, an anti-innovation atmosphere in healthcare for domestic and reverse innovators alike. Reverse innovation should be fostered through the thoughtful development of

Bringing the field into the classroom: an innovative methodology in global health teaching

OpenAIRE

Dr. M H Bryant, MBBS; J Wolff, MD

2015-01-01

Background: The practice of global health is difficult to teach from a US-based classroom. Students benefit from experiencing how theory becomes practice in the chaotic environments of under-resourced health programmes in developing countries. We could not take our students to the field during weekly course work, so we designed a course to bring the field to the students. We created innovative partnerships with locally based organisations that implement programmes in developing countries. Eac...

[Horus: technological innovation in pharmaceutical assistance within the Brazilian unified health system].

Science.gov (United States)

Costa, Karen Sarmento; Nascimento, José Miguel do

2012-12-01

To analyze results of the Horus Information System, comparing elements of this system with some international experiences. Horus is a technological innovation introduced in 2009 in the Pharmaceutical management information system of the Sistema Único de Saúde (Brazilian Unified Health System). In 2011, local managers and health professionals of 1,247 municipalities (16 states) that adhered to Horus answered questionnaires on pharmaceutical assistance in primary care and about the Horus system. This is a descriptive and exploratory study, developed with the use of quantitative and qualitative methods of research. Multivariate tools were used for data collection and interpretative support of the statistical inference and thematic analysis. The main changes identified after the implementation of this system were: improvement on technical and scientific quality control of Pharmaceutical Assistance, improvement on the supply of medications and health care; training of human resources and knowledge management; improvement on the relationship health managers/users; development in the administrative management and greater inter-state management; and improvement on the technological infrastructure. In terms of health information systems, these categories are consistent with programs and obstacles observed in international experiences. The biggest gap identified was the fact that Horus was not included in a national policy of health information systems, which is in a process of consolidation in Brazil. The national database of actions and services within the Pharmaceutical Assistance will enable the collection, analysis and dissemination of information regarding integrated pharmaceutical assistance in the Brazilian context. The Horus System is a technological innovation that enables the management of the Pharmaceutical Assistance. The national base will enable the definition and agreement on national indicators of Pharmaceutical Assistance, aiming to produce evidence of

CMS Innovation Center - Data and Reports

Data.gov (United States)

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services — The CMS Innovation Center maintains an expanding portfolio supporting the development and testing of innovative health care payment and service delivery models. As...

E-Mental Health Innovations for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians: A Qualitative Study of Implementation Needs in Health Services.

Science.gov (United States)

Puszka, Stefanie; Dingwall, Kylie M; Sweet, Michelle; Nagel, Tricia

2016-09-19

Electronic mental health (e-mental health) interventions offer effective, easily accessible, and cost effective treatment and support for mental illness and well-being concerns. However, e-mental health approaches have not been well utilized by health services to date and little is known about their implementation in practice, particularly in diverse contexts and communities. This study aims to understand stakeholder perspectives on the requirements for implementing e-mental health approaches in regional and remote health services for Indigenous Australians. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 32 managers, directors, chief executive officers (CEOs), and senior practitioners of mental health, well-being, alcohol and other drug and chronic disease services. The implementation of e-mental health approaches in this context is likely to be influenced by characteristics related to the adopter (practitioner skill and knowledge, client characteristics, communication barriers), the innovation (engaging and supportive approach, culturally appropriate design, evidence base, data capture, professional development opportunities), and organizational systems (innovation-systems fit, implementation planning, investment). There is potential for e-mental health approaches to address mental illness and poor social and emotional well-being amongst Indigenous people and to advance their quality of care. Health service stakeholders reported that e-mental health interventions are likely to be most effective when used to support or extend existing health services, including elements of client-driven and practitioner-supported use. Potential solutions to obstacles for integration of e-mental health approaches into practice were proposed including practitioner training, appropriate tool design using a consultative approach, internal organizational directives and support structures, adaptations to existing systems and policies, implementation planning and organizational and government

Innovation and participation for healthy public policy: the first National Health Assembly in Thailand.

Science.gov (United States)

Rasanathan, Kumanan; Posayanonda, Tipicha; Birmingham, Maureen; Tangcharoensathien, Viroj

2012-03-01

This paper aims to describe and disseminate the process and initial outcomes of the first National Health Assembly (NHA) in Thailand, as an innovative example of health policy making. The first NHA, held in December 2008 in Bangkok, brought together over 1500 people from government agencies, academia, civil society, health professionals and the private sector to discuss key health issues and produce resolutions to guide policy making. It adapted the approach used at the World Health Assembly of the World Health Organization. Findings are derived from a literature review, document analysis, and the views and experiences of the authors, two of whom contributed to the organization of the NHA and two of whom were invited external observers. Fourteen agenda items were discussed and resolutions passed. Potential early impacts on policy making have included an increase in the 2010 public budget for Thailand's universal health coverage scheme as total public expenditure has decreased; cabinet endorsement of proposed Strategies for Universal Access to Medicines for Thai People; and establishment of National Commissions on Health Impact Assessment and Trade and Health. The NHA was successful in bringing together various actors and sectors involved in the social production of health, including groups often marginalized in policy making. It provides an innovative model of how governments may be able to increase public participation and intersectoral collaboration that could be adapted in other contexts. Significant challenges remain in ensuring full participation of interested groups and in implementing, and monitoring the impact of, the resolutions passed. © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Shifting management of a community volunteer system for improved child health outcomes: results from an operations research study in Burundi.

Science.gov (United States)

Weiss, Jennifer; Makonnen, Raphael; Sula, Delphin

2015-01-01

Community-based strategies that foster frequent contact between caregivers of children under five and provide credible sources of health information are essential to improve child survival. Care Groups are a community-based implementation strategy for the delivery of social and behavior change interventions. This study assessed if supervision of Care Group activities by Ministry of Health (MOH) personnel could achieve the same child health outcomes as supervision provided by specialized non-governmental organization (NGO) staff. The study was a pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design implemented in Burundi. A total of 45 MOH-led Care Groups with 478 Care Group Volunteers (CGVs) were established in the intervention area; and 50 NGO-led Care Groups with 509 CGVs were formed in the comparison area. Data were collected from 593 and 700 mothers of children 0-23 months at baseline and endline, respectively. Pearson's chi-squared test and difference-in-difference analysis assessed changes in 40 child health and nutrition outcomes. A qualitative process evaluation was also conducted midway through the study. The MOH-led Care Group model performed at least as well as the NGO-led model in achieving specific child health and nutrition outcomes. Mothers of children 0-23 months in the intervention and comparison sites reported similar levels of knowledge and practices for 38 of 40 dependent variables measured in the study, and these results remained unchanged after accounting for differences in the indicator values at baseline. Process monitoring data confirmed that the MOH-led Care Group model and the NGO-led Care Group model were implemented with similar intervention strength. The study demonstrated that behavior change interventions traditionally led by NGOs can be implemented through the existing MOH systems and achieve similar results, thereby increasing the potential for sustainable child health outcomes. Future research on the MOH-led Care Group model is required to

Do entrepreneurial food systems innovations impact rural economies and health? Evidence and gaps.

Science.gov (United States)

Sitaker, Marilyn; Kolodinsky, Jane; Jilcott Pitts, Stephanie B; Seguin, Rebecca A

A potential solution for weakened rural economies is the development of local food systems, which include affordable foods sources for consumers and economically feasible structures for producers. Local food systems are purported to promote sustainability, improve local economies, increase access to healthy foods, and improve the local diets. Four entrepreneurial food systems innovations that support local economies include farmers' markets, community supported agriculture, farm to institution programs and food hubs. We review current literature to determine whether innovations for aggregation, processing, distribution and marketing in local food systems: 1) enable producers to make a living; 2) improve local economies; 3) provide local residents with greater access to affordable, healthy food; and 4) contribute to greater consumption of healthy food among residents. While there is some evidence for each, more transdisciplinary research is needed to determine whether entrepreneurial food systems innovations provide economic and public health benefits.

Testing the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research on health care innovations from South Yorkshire.

Science.gov (United States)

Ilott, Irene; Gerrish, Kate; Booth, Andrew; Field, Becky

2013-10-01

There is an international imperative to implement research into clinical practice to improve health care. Understanding the dynamics of change requires knowledge from theoretical and empirical studies. This paper presents a novel approach to testing a new meta theoretical framework: the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research. The utility of the Framework was evaluated using a post hoc, deductive analysis of 11 narrative accounts of innovation in health care services and practice from England, collected in 2010. A matrix, comprising the five domains and 39 constructs of the Framework was developed to examine the coherence of the terminology, to compare results across contexts and to identify new theoretical developments. The Framework captured the complexity of implementation across 11 diverse examples, offering theoretically informed, comprehensive coverage. The Framework drew attention to relevant points in individual cases together with patterns across cases; for example, all were internally developed innovations that brought direct or indirect patient advantage. In 10 cases, the change was led by clinicians. Most initiatives had been maintained for several years and there was evidence of spread in six examples. Areas for further development within the Framework include sustainability and patient/public engagement in implementation. Our analysis suggests that this conceptual framework has the potential to offer useful insights, whether as part of a situational analysis or by developing context-specific propositions for hypothesis testing. Such studies are vital now that innovation is being promoted as core business for health care. © 2012 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Developing an Innovative Customer Relationship Management Model for Better Health Examination Service

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lyu JrJung

2014-11-01

Full Text Available People emphasize on their own health and wish to know more about their conditions. Chronic diseases now take up to 50 percent of top 10 causes of death. As a result, the health-care industry has emerged and kept thriving. This work adopts an innovative customer-oriented business model since most clients are proactive and spontaneous in taking the “distinguished” health examination programs. We adopt the soft system dynamics methodology (SSDM to develop and to evaluate the steps of introducing customer relationship management model into a case health examination organization. Quantitative results are also presented for a case physical examination center and to assess the improved efficiency. The case study shows that the procedures developed here could provide a better service.

China-Africa Health Development Initiatives: Benefits and Implications for Shaping Innovative and Evidence-informed National Health Policies and Programs in Sub-saharan African Countries

Science.gov (United States)

Tambo, Ernest; Ugwu, Chidiebere E.; Guan, Yayi; Wei, Ding; Xiao-Ning; Xiao-Nong, Zhou

2016-01-01

Background and Introduction: This review paper examines the growing implications of China’s engagement in shaping innovative national initiatives against infectious diseases and poverty control and elimination in African countries. It seeks to understand the factors and enhancers that can promote mutual and innovative health development initiatives, and those that are necessary in generating reliable and quality data for evidence-based contextual policy, priorities and programs. Methods: We examined the China-Africa health cooperation in supporting global health agenda on infectious diseases such as malaria, schistosomiasis, Ebola, TB, HIV/AIDS, neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) prevention, control and elimination spanning a period of 10 years. We reviewed referenced publications, global support data, and extensive sources related to and other emerging epidemics and infectious diseases of poverty, programs and interventions, health systems development issues, challenges, opportunities and investments. Published literature in PubMed, Scopus, Google Scholar, Books and web-based peer-reviewed journal articles, government annual reports were assessed from the first Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in November 2006 to December 2015 Third Ministerial conferences. Results: Our findings highlight current shared public health challenges and emphasize the need to nurture, develop and establish effective, functional and sustainable health systems capacity to detect and respond to all public health threats and epidemic burdens, evidence-based programs and quality care outcomes. China’s significant health diplomacy emphasizes the importance of health financing in establishing health development commitment and investment in improving the gains and opportunities, importantly efficiency and value health priorities and planning. Conclusions and Global Health Implications: Strengthening China-Africa health development agenda towards collective commitment and investment

Educational innovations to foster resilience in the health professions.

Science.gov (United States)

Kreitzer, Mary Jo; Klatt, Maryanna

2017-02-01

Stress and burnout of healthcare providers has become a major healthcare issue that has implications for not only workforce projections, but the cost and quality of care and the lives of healthcare providers and their families. Burnout, characterized by loss of enthusiasm for work, feelings of cynicism and a low sense of personal accomplishment is associated with early retirement, alcohol use, and suicidal ideation. Healthcare professional "wellbeing" or "care of the caregiver" is a topic that has not been significantly addressed in the education of healthcare professionals. The culture that has dominated much of education has been one where students have been expected to forego personal needs, endure stressful environments, and emerge from highly competitive and often dysfunctional environments to work in care settings where health and wellbeing is also largely ignored. Three curricular innovations are highlighted that target pre-professional students, students enrolled in health professions education and practicing health care professionals. Strategies are highlighted that both help individuals cultivate resiliency and wellbeing in their personal and professional lives and that address system issues that contribute to unhealthy learning and work environments.

Harmonization of clinical laboratories in Africa: a multidisciplinary approach to identify innovative and sustainable technical solutions.

Science.gov (United States)

Putoto, Giovanni; Cortese, Antonella; Pecorari, Ilaria; Musi, Roberto; Nunziata, Enrico

2015-06-01

In an effective and efficient health system, laboratory medicine should play a critical role. This is not the case in Africa, where there is a lack of demand for diagnostic exams due to mistrust of health laboratory performance. Doctors with Africa CUAMM (Collegio Universitario Aspiranti Medici Missionari) is a non-profit organization, working mainly in sub-Saharan Africa (Angola, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda) to help and sustain local health systems. Doctors with Africa CUAMM has advocated the need for a harmonized model for health laboratories to assess and evaluate the performance of the facilities in which they operate. In order to develop a harmonized model for African health laboratories, previous attempts at strengthening them through standardization were taken into consideration and reviewed. A survey with four Italian clinicians experienced in the field was then performed to try and understand the actual needs of health facilities. Finally a market survey was conducted to find new technologies able to update the resulting model. Comparison of actual laboratories with the developed standard - which represents the best setting any African health laboratory could aim for - allowed shortcomings in expected services to be identified and interventions subsequently prioritized. The most appropriate equipment was proposed to perform the envisaged techniques. The suitability of appliances was evaluated in consideration of recognized international recommendations, reported experiences in the field, and the availability of innovative solutions that can be performed on site in rural areas, but require minimal sample preparation and little technical expertise. The present work has developed a new, up-to-date, harmonized model for African health laboratories. The authors suggest lists of procedures to challenge the major African health problems - HIV/AIDS, malaria, tubercolosis (TB) - at each level of pyramidal health system. This

Understanding Whole Systems Change in Health Care: Insights into System Level Diffusion from Nursing Service Delivery Innovations--A Multiple Case Study

Science.gov (United States)

Berta, Whitney; Virani, Tazim; Bajnok, Irmajean; Edwards, Nancy; Rowan, Margo

2014-01-01

Our study responds to calls for theory-driven approaches to studying innovation diffusion processes in health care. While most research on diffusion in health care is situated at the service delivery level, we study innovations and associated processes that have diffused to the system level, and refer to work on complex adaptive systems and whole…

China-Africa Health Development Initiatives: Benefits and Implications for Shaping Innovative and Evidence-informed National Health Policies and Programs in Sub-saharan African Countries.

Science.gov (United States)

Tambo, Ernest; Ugwu, Chidiebere E; Guan, Yayi; Wei, Ding; Xiao-Ning; Xiao-Nong, Zhou

2016-01-01

This review paper examines the growing implications of China's engagement in shaping innovative national initiatives against infectious diseases and poverty control and elimination in African countries. It seeks to understand the factors and enhancers that can promote mutual and innovative health development initiatives, and those that are necessary in generating reliable and quality data for evidence-based contextual policy, priorities and programs. We examined the China-Africa health cooperation in supporting global health agenda on infectious diseases such as malaria, schistosomiasis, Ebola, TB, HIV/AIDS, neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) prevention, control and elimination spanning a period of 10 years. We reviewed referenced publications, global support data, and extensive sources related to and other emerging epidemics and infectious diseases of poverty, programs and interventions, health systems development issues, challenges, opportunities and investments. Published literature in PubMed, Scopus, Google Scholar, Books and web-based peer-reviewed journal articles, government annual reports were assessed from the first Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in November 2006 to December 2015 Third Ministerial conferences. Our findings highlight current shared public health challenges and emphasize the need to nurture, develop and establish effective, functional and sustainable health systems capacity to detect and respond to all public health threats and epidemic burdens, evidence-based programs and quality care outcomes. China's significant health diplomacy emphasizes the importance of health financing in establishing health development commitment and investment in improving the gains and opportunities, importantly efficiency and value health priorities and planning. Strengthening China-Africa health development agenda towards collective commitment and investment in quality care delivery, effective programs coverage and efficiency, preparedness and

The work of local healthcare innovation: a qualitative study of GP-led integrated diabetes care in primary health care.

Science.gov (United States)

Foster, Michele; Burridge, Letitia; Donald, Maria; Zhang, Jianzhen; Jackson, Claire

2016-01-14

Service delivery innovation is at the heart of efforts to combat the growing burden of chronic disease and escalating healthcare expenditure. Small-scale, locally-led service delivery innovation is a valuable source of learning about the complexities of change and the actions of local change agents. This exploratory qualitative study captures the perspectives of clinicians and managers involved in a general practitioner-led integrated diabetes care innovation. Data on these change agents' perspectives on the local innovation and how it works in the local context were collected through focus groups and semi-structured interviews at two primary health care sites. Transcribed data were analysed thematically. Normalization Process Theory provided a framework to explore perspectives on the individual and collective work involved in putting the innovation into practice in local service delivery contexts. Twelve primary health care clinicians, hospital-based medical specialists and practice managers participated in the study, which represented the majority involved in the innovation at the two sites. The thematic analysis highlighted three main themes of local innovation work: 1) trusting and embedding new professional relationships; 2) synchronizing services and resources; and 3) reconciling realities of innovation work. As a whole, the findings show that while locally-led service delivery innovation is designed to respond to local problems, convincing others to trust change and managing the boundary tensions is core to local work, particularly when it challenges taken-for-granted practices and relationships. Despite this, the findings also show that local innovators can and do act in both discretionary and creative ways to progress the innovation. The use of Normalization Process Theory uncovered some critical professional, organizational and structural factors early in the progression of the innovation. The key to local service delivery innovation lies in building

Innovations in occupational health nursing education, including a distance learning approach.

Science.gov (United States)

Lowis, A; Ellington, H

1991-07-01

The results of a survey in the United Kingdom in the late 1980s indicated that many occupational health nurses were not being sent for formal training because of the length of time nurses needed to be away from their employment and the difficulty employers had in finding nurse replacements during training. To meet the needs of occupational health nurses and their employers, the Robert Gordon Institute of Technology (RGIT) instituted a modular training course that offers full time attendance or distance learning options. RGIT's course consists of six modules over a 1 to 3 year period, which students can take in any order after completing a short Return to Study course. Using the innovative distance learning option, occupational health nurses can earn a Diploma in Occupational Health Nursing while completing most of their courses at the workplace, thus avoiding conflicts between training and work schedules.

Innovation in health service management: Adoption of project management offices to support major health care transformation.

Science.gov (United States)

Lavoie-Tremblay, Mélanie; Aubry, Monique; Cyr, Guylaine; Richer, Marie-Claire; Fortin-Verreault, Jean-François; Fortin, Claude; Marchionni, Caroline

2017-11-01

To explore the characteristics that influence project management offices acceptance and adoption in healthcare sector. The creation of project management offices has been suggested as a promising avenue to promote successful organisational change and facilitate evidence-based practice. However, little is known about the characteristics that promote their initial adoption and acceptance in health care sector. This knowledge is important in the context where many organisations are considering implementing project management offices with nurse managers as leaders. A descriptive multiple case study design was used. The unit of analysis was the project management offices. The study was conducted in three university-affiliated teaching hospitals in 2013-14 (Canada). Individual interviews (n = 34) were conducted with senior managers. Results reveal that project management offices dedicated to project and change management constitute an innovation and an added value that addresses tangible needs in the field. Project management offices are an innovation highly compatible with health care managers and their approach has parallels to the process of clinical problem solving and reasoning well-known to adopters. This knowledge is important in a context where many nurses hold various roles in project management offices, such as Director, project manager, clinical expert and knowledge broker. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Effectiveness of Various Innovative Learning Methods in Health Science Classrooms: A Meta-Analysis

Science.gov (United States)

Kalaian, Sema A.; Kasim, Rafa M.

2017-01-01

This study reports the results of a meta-analysis of the available literature on the effectiveness of various forms of innovative small-group learning methods on student achievement in undergraduate college health science classrooms. The results of the analysis revealed that most of the primary studies supported the effectiveness of the…

Limonene: Aroma of innovation in health and disease.

Science.gov (United States)

Vieira, A J; Beserra, F P; Souza, M C; Totti, B M; Rozza, A L

2018-03-01

Natural products obtained in dietary components may aid the prevention and treatment of a variety of diseases. Reports in the scientific literature have demonstrated that the consumption of terpenes is a successful alternative in the treatment of several diseases, triggering beneficial biological effects in clinical and preclinical studies. The monoterpene limonene is largely used in alimentary items, cleaning products, and it is one of the most frequent fragrances used in cosmetics formulation. The therapeutic effects of limonene have been extensively studied, proving anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, antinociceptive, anticancer, antidiabetic, antihyperalgesic, antiviral, and gastroprotective effects, among other beneficial effects in health. In this review, we collected, presented, and analyzed evidence from the scientific literature regarding the usage of limonene and its activities and underlying mechanisms involved in combating diseases. The highlighting of limonene applications could develop a useful targeting of innovative research in this field as well as the development of a limonene-based phytomedicine which could be used in a variety of conditions of health and disease. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

[Hospital-based health technology assessment in France: how to proceed to evaluate innovative medical devices?].

Science.gov (United States)

Martelli, N; van den Brink, H; Denies, F; Dervaux, B; Germe, A F; Prognon, P; Pineau, J

2014-01-01

Innovative medical devices offer solutions to medical problems and greatly improve patients' outcomes. Like National Health Technology Assessment (HTA) agencies, hospitals face numerous requests for innovative and costly medical devices. To help local decision-makers, different approaches of hospital-based HTA (HB-HTA) have been adopted worldwide. The objective of the present paper is to explore HB-HTA models for adopting innovative medical devices in France and elsewhere. Four different models have been conceptualized: "ambassador" model, "mini-HTA" model, "HTA unit" model and "internal committee". Apparently, "HTA unit" and "internal committee" (or a mixture of both models) are the prevailing HB-HTA models in France. Nevertheless, some weaknesses of these models have been pointed out in previous works. Only few examples involving hospital pharmacists have been found abroad, except in France and in Italy. Finally, the harmonization of the assessment of innovative medical devices in France needs a better understanding of HB-HTA practices. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

Supporting Better Evidence Generation and Use within Social Innovation in Health in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Qualitative Study.

Science.gov (United States)

Ballard, Madeleine; Tran, Jenny; Hersch, Fred; Lockwood, Amy; Hartigan, Pamela; Montgomery, Paul

2017-01-01

While several papers have highlighted a lack of evidence to scale social innovations in health, fewer have explored decision-maker understandings of the relative merit of different types of evidence, how such data are interpreted and applied, and what practical support is required to improve evidence generation. The objectives of this paper are to understand (1) beliefs and attitudes towards the value of and types of evidence in scaling social innovations for health, (2) approaches to evidence generation and evaluation used in systems and policy change, and (3) how better evidence-generation can be undertaken and supported within social innovation in health. Thirty-two one-on-one interviews were conducted between July and November 2015 with purposively selected practitioners, policymakers, and funders from low- and middle- income countries (LMICs). Data were analysed using a Framework Analysis Approach. While practitioners, funders, and policymakers said they held outcome evidence in high regard, their practices only bear out this assertion to varying degrees. Few have given systematic consideration to potential unintended consequences, in particular harm, of the programs they implement, fund, or adopt. Stakeholders suggest that better evidence-generation can be undertaken and supported within social innovation in health by supporting the research efforts of emerging community organizations; creating links between practitioners and academia; altering the funding landscape for evidence-generation; providing responsive technical education; and creating accountability for funders, practitioners, and policymakers. How better evidence-generation can be undertaken and supported within social innovation in health is a previously under-operationalised aspect of the policy-making process that remains essential in order to refrain from causing harm, enable the optimization of existing interventions, and ultimately, to scale and fund what works.

From translational research to open technology innovation systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Savory, Clive; Fortune, Joyce

2015-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to question whether the emphasis placed within translational research on a linear model of innovation provides the most effective model for managing health technology innovation. Several alternative perspectives are presented that have potential to enhance the existing model of translational research. A case study is presented of innovation of a clinical decision support system. The paper concludes from the case study that an extending the triple helix model of technology transfer, to one based on a quadruple helix, present a basis for improving the performance translational research. A case study approach is used to help understand development of an innovative technology within a teaching hospital. The case is then used to develop and refine a model of the health technology innovation system. The paper concludes from the case study that existing models of translational research could be refined further through the development of a quadruple helix model of heath technology innovation that encompasses greater emphasis on user-led and open innovation perspectives. The paper presents several implications for future research based on the need to enhance the model of health technology innovation used to guide policy and practice. The quadruple helix model of innovation that is proposed can potentially guide alterations to the existing model of translational research in the healthcare sector. Several suggestions are made for how innovation activity can be better supported at both a policy and operational level. This paper presents a synthesis of the innovation literature applied to a theoretically important case of open innovation in the UK National Health Service. It draws in perspectives from other industrial sectors and applies them specifically to the management and organisation of innovation activities around health technology and the services in which they are embedded.

Effectiveness of various innovative learning methods in health science classrooms: a meta-analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Kalaian, Sema A; Kasim, Rafa M

2017-12-01

This study reports the results of a meta-analysis of the available literature on the effectiveness of various forms of innovative small-group learning methods on student achievement in undergraduate college health science classrooms. The results of the analysis revealed that most of the primary studies supported the effectiveness of the small-group learning methods in improving students' academic achievement with an overall weighted average effect-size of 0.59 in standard deviation units favoring small-group learning methods. The subgroup analysis showed that the various forms of innovative and reform-based small-group learning interventions appeared to be significantly more effective for students in higher levels of college classes (sophomore, junior, and senior levels), students in other countries (non-U.S.) worldwide, students in groups of four or less, and students who choose their own group. The random-effects meta-regression results revealed that the effect sizes were influenced significantly by the instructional duration of the primary studies. This means that studies with longer hours of instruction yielded higher effect sizes and on average every 1 h increase in instruction, the predicted increase in effect size was 0.009 standard deviation units, which is considered as a small effect. These results may help health science and nursing educators by providing guidance in identifying the conditions under which various forms of innovative small-group learning pedagogies are collectively more effective than the traditional lecture-based teaching instruction.

Case studies in public-private-partnership in health with the focus of enhancing the accessibility of health interventions.

Science.gov (United States)

Njau, R J A; Mosha, F W; De Savigny, D

2009-10-01

Various definitions have been framed for public-private partnerships (PPPs) in health depending on the desired relationship and the characteristics of the respective sectors. These relationships span from a continuum of loose relationships with narrow objectives, lack of a legal status and an absence of a formalized membership or governing body to high level institutionalization. The latter includes concrete objectives, the presence of a legal status and permanent multi-sectoral membership. The study used qualitative research methods including case studies, literature review and interview with key informants. The research undertakes an extensive literature review of various PPP models in health in scale and in scope which are aimed at advancing public health goals in developing countries. The major emphasis is on a qualitative description of some of the PPPs in the planning and implementation phases, including the challenges encountered. This background is used to analyse in-depth two case studies which are both health oriented; the first one is a national level NGO consortium with a focus on malaria and the second one is an international advocacy group with an overarching goal of protecting children against malaria through an innovative mechanism. The case study approach is used to analyze why the PPP approach was used to address malaria control and how it was implemented. Both PPPs demonstrated that relationships between the public and private sector may begin from very humble and loose beginnings. However, with perseverance from committed individuals, a vision and trustworthiness may become powerful advocates for meeting prescribed health agendas. In conclusion, three key themes (trust, sacrifice and championship) run vividly through the case studies and are significant for developing countries to emulate.

Public sector innovation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wegener, Charlotte

2012-01-01

This paper explores the value dimension of public innovation in the light of practitioners’ values and asks why there seems to be a clash between innovation imperatives and workplace practices in the public sector. The paper contributes to the research on public innovation from a practice...... perspective by providing evidence from an ethnographic field study on innovation in social and health care studies in Denmark. These studies are part of the vocational education and training (VET) system, which combines coursework at a college and internship in the elder care sector. The study is thus cross...... initiate innovations grounded in their values. The main point put forward is that the value dimension of public innovation must be understood not only in terms of value creation (economic or non-economic), which frontline practitioners are required to contribute to, but also as value-based practices...

Police custody health care: a review of health morbidity, models of care and innovations within police custody in the UK, with international comparisons

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

McKinnon IG

2016-09-01

Full Text Available Iain G McKinnon,1,2 Stuart DM Thomas,3–5 Heather L Noga,6 Jane Senior7 1Institute of Health and Society, Newcastle University, Academic Psychiatry, Campus for Ageing and Vitality, 2Northumberland Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK; 3School of Global, Urban and Social Studies, RMIT University, Melbourne, VIC, 4Legal Intersections Research Centre, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, 5Southern Clinical School, Monash University, Clayton, VIC, Australia; 6School of Criminology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, BC, Canada; 7Offender Health Research Network, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK Abstract: This paper is a scoping review of the available evidence regarding health care issues in police custody. It describes the types and prevalence of health disorders encountered in custody and provides an overview of current practice and recent innovations in police custody health care. In contrast to the health of prisoners, the health of police custody detainees has, until recently, received little academic or clinical attention. Studies on health care in police custody identified for this review are limited to a few geographical jurisdictions, including the UK, continental Europe, North America, and Australia. There are significant health concerns among police detainees including acute injury, chronic physical health problems, mental and cognitive disorders, and the risks associated with drug and alcohol intoxication or withdrawal. There is some evidence that deaths in police custody have reduced where attention has been paid to the latter issue. Police personnel continue to experience difficulties identifying detainees with health issues relevant to their safe detention, but research shows that the use of evidence-based screening tools improves detection of such morbidities. Innovations in police custody health care mainly relate to detainees with mental disorders, including improved identification of illness

[Transfer and Implementation of Innovative Awareness and Education Measures, e-Mental Health and Care Models in psychenet - Hamburg Network for Mental Health].

Science.gov (United States)

Lambert, Martin; Härter, Martin; Brandes, Andreas; Hillebrandt, Bernd; Schlüter, Catarina; Quante, Susanne

2015-07-01

The Hamburg Network for Mental Health belongs to the healthcare regions in Germany, funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research from 2011 to 2015. More than 330 partners from research, health care, health industry and government are promoting innovative health care models and products to improve mental health care in Hamburg. The main objectives comprise the sustained implementation of the Network itself and of successful health care models and products. The article describes current and future implementation possibilities and the present state of the implementation process. © Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart · New York.

An Innovative Model of Integrated Behavioral Health: School Psychologists in Pediatric Primary Care Settings

Science.gov (United States)

Adams, Carolyn D.; Hinojosa, Sara; Armstrong, Kathleen; Takagishi, Jennifer; Dabrow, Sharon

2016-01-01

This article discusses an innovative example of integrated care in which doctoral level school psychology interns and residents worked alongside pediatric residents and pediatricians in the primary care settings to jointly provide services to patients. School psychologists specializing in pediatric health are uniquely trained to recognize and…

An NTSB for health care: learning from innovation: debate and innovate or capitulate.

Science.gov (United States)

Denham, Charles R; Sullenberger, Chesley B; Quaid, Dennis W; Nance, John J

2012-03-01

Economic and medical risks threaten the national security of America. The spiraling costs of United States' avoidable healthcare harm and waste far exceed those of any other nation. This 2-part paper, written by a group of aviators, is a national call to action to adopt readily available and transferable safety innovations we have already paid for that have made the airline industry one of the safest in the world. This first part supports the debate for a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) for health care, and the second supports more cross-over adoption by hospitals of methods pioneered in aviation. A review of aviation and healthcare leadership best practices and technologies was undertaken through literature review, reporting body research, and interviews of experts in the field of aviation principles applied to medicine. An aviation cross-over inventory and consensus process led to a call for action to address the current crisis of healthcare waste and harm. The NTSB, an independent agency established by the United States Congress, was developed to investigate all significant transportation accidents to prevent recurrence. Certain NTSB publications known as "Blue Cover Reports" used by pilots and airlines to drive safety provide a model that could be emulated for hospital accidents. An NTSB-type organization for health care could greatly improve healthcare safety at low cost and great benefit. A "Red Cover Report" for health care could save lives, save money, and bring value to communities. A call to action is made in this first paper to debate this opportunity for an NTSB for health care. A second follow-on paper is a call to action of healthcare suppliers, providers, and purchasers to reinvigorate their adoption of aviation best practices as the market transitions from a fragmented provider-volume-centered to an integrated patient-value-centered world.

Counting rooftops: Innovative remote-sensing techniques chart ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

2012-12-17

Dec 17, 2012 ... An influx of poor people settled in the urban districts they could afford ... (DW Angola), a non-governmental organization (NGO) based in Luanda. ... Among these results were basic demographic models of the three cities, ...

Investing in nursing and midwifery enterprise: Empowering women and strengthening health systems--A landscaping study of innovations in low- and middle-income countries.

Science.gov (United States)

Krubiner, Carleigh B; Salmon, Marla; Synowiec, Christina; Lagomarsino, Gina

2016-01-01

Women's empowerment and global health promotion are both central aims in the development agenda, with positive associations and feedback loops between empowerment and health outcomes. To date, most of the work exploring connections between health and empowerment has focused on women as health consumers. This article summarizes a much longer landscape review that examines ways in which various health programs can empower women as providers, specifically nurses and midwives. We conducted a scan of the Center for Health Market Innovations database to identify how innovative health programs can create empowerment opportunities for nurses and midwives. We reviewed 94 programs, exploring nurses' and midwives' roles and inputs that contribute to their empowerment. There were four salient models: provider training, information and communications technologies, cooperatives, and clinical franchises. By documenting these approaches and their hallmarks for empowering female health workers, we hope to stimulate greater uptake of health innovations coupled with gender-empowerment opportunities globally. The full report with expanded methodology and findings is available online. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Supporting Better Evidence Generation and Use within Social Innovation in Health in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Qualitative Study.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Madeleine Ballard

Full Text Available While several papers have highlighted a lack of evidence to scale social innovations in health, fewer have explored decision-maker understandings of the relative merit of different types of evidence, how such data are interpreted and applied, and what practical support is required to improve evidence generation. The objectives of this paper are to understand (1 beliefs and attitudes towards the value of and types of evidence in scaling social innovations for health, (2 approaches to evidence generation and evaluation used in systems and policy change, and (3 how better evidence-generation can be undertaken and supported within social innovation in health.Thirty-two one-on-one interviews were conducted between July and November 2015 with purposively selected practitioners, policymakers, and funders from low- and middle- income countries (LMICs. Data were analysed using a Framework Analysis Approach.While practitioners, funders, and policymakers said they held outcome evidence in high regard, their practices only bear out this assertion to varying degrees. Few have given systematic consideration to potential unintended consequences, in particular harm, of the programs they implement, fund, or adopt. Stakeholders suggest that better evidence-generation can be undertaken and supported within social innovation in health by supporting the research efforts of emerging community organizations; creating links between practitioners and academia; altering the funding landscape for evidence-generation; providing responsive technical education; and creating accountability for funders, practitioners, and policymakers.How better evidence-generation can be undertaken and supported within social innovation in health is a previously under-operationalised aspect of the policy-making process that remains essential in order to refrain from causing harm, enable the optimization of existing interventions, and ultimately, to scale and fund what works.

An innovative approach to interdisciplinary occupational safety and health education.

Science.gov (United States)

Rosen, Mitchel A; Caravanos, Jack; Milek, Debra; Udasin, Iris

2011-07-01

The New York and New Jersey Education and Research Center (ERC) provides a range of graduate continuing education for occupational safety and health (OSH) professionals in training. A key element of the education is to provide interdisciplinary training to industrial hygienists, ergonomists, occupational medicine physicians and other health and safety trainees to prepare them for the collaboration required to solve the complex occupational health and safety problems they will face in their careers. This center has developed an innovative interdisciplinary training approach that provides an historical aspect, while allowing the graduate students to identify solutions to occupational issues from a multi-disciplinary approach. The ERC developed a tour that brings students to sites of historical and/or contemporary significance in the occupational safety and health and environmental fields. The ERC has conducted five tours, and has included 85 students and residents as participants. 80% of participants rated the tour as providing a high amount of OSH knowledge gained. 98% of the participants felt the goal of providing interdisciplinary education was achieved. This tour has been successful in bridging the OSH fields to better understand how occupational and environmental exposures have occurred, in order to prevent future exposures so that workplace conditions and health can be improved. Copyright © 2011 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Road Map For Diffusion Of Innovation In Health Care.

Science.gov (United States)

Balas, E Andrew; Chapman, Wendy W

2018-02-01

New scientific knowledge and innovation are often slow to disseminate. In other cases, providers rush into adopting what appears to be a clinically relevant innovation, based on a single clinical trial. In reality, adopting innovations without appropriate translation and repeated testing of practical application is problematic. In this article we provide examples of clinical innovations (for example, tight glucose control in critically ill patients) that were adopted inappropriately and that caused what we term a malfunction. To address the issue of malfunctions, we review various examples and suggest frameworks for the diffusion of knowledge leading to the adoption of useful innovations. The resulting model is termed an integrated road map for coordinating knowledge transformation and innovation adoption. We make recommendations for the targeted development of practice change procedures, practice change assessment, structured descriptions of tested interventions, intelligent knowledge management technologies, and policy support for knowledge transformation, including further standardization to facilitate sharing among institutions.

Distributed leadership - Strenghtening the condition for continious innovation in primary health organizations

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Günzel-Jensen, Franziska; Ulhøi, John Parm

on distributed leadership as a means to influence resource availability, decision making and goal setting in an organizational setting. The overall RQ guiding this research is: how does DL need to be enacted to enable change and continuous innovation in healthcare. We first introduce a theory developing case...... study of four units within a Danish hospital with about 4500 employees. Our findings identify a mix of emergent and contextualized leadership which needs time to be enacted. Furthermore, we find that resource allocation, social capital accumulation, collaborative work culture, and legitimacy building......Public hospitals need to change and innovate to handle the challenges of increasing demands for more, faster, better and cheaper health provision. Practicing leadership does not occur in a sterile context but in a highly contextual and social setting. This in turn invites for focussing...

Potential stakeholders and perceived benefits of a Digital Health Innovation Ecosystem for the Namibian context

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Iyawa, GE

2017-10-01

Full Text Available This paper presents the result of a study which aimed at identifying the potential stakeholders and perceived benefits of a digital health innovation ecosystem for the Namibian context as part of a larger study. Combining semi-structured interviews...

Determinants, obstacles, sources and cooperation to innovation in Portuguese firms, using community innovation survey

Science.gov (United States)

Correia, Aldina; Braga, Alexandra; Braga, Vitor

2017-06-01

Innovation is a topic of interest for the management researchers, confirmed by the creation of a Community Innovation Survey, which is an harmonised tool designed to provide information about Innovation in European Union enterprises. In this study, we use factorial analysis to identify the determinants and obstacles to innovation in Portuguese firms. The sources of innovation and cooperation to innovation are also analysed, using crossed information. For the determinants of innovation six factors were identified: Production costs and impacts to health and environment, Process and product innovation, Organizational innovation, Institutional sources of information, Others sources of information and Market sources of information. Obstacles to innovation were clustered into three groups: Knowledge and market factors, Cost factors and Reasons not to innovate. The main sources of innovation identified, in this study, are Suppliers and Clients, located in Portugal and in Europe. Cooperation partners are also majority Clients and Suppliers, in addition to other enterprises in the same group.

Installed Base as a Facilitator for User-Driven Innovation: How Can User Innovation Challenge Existing Institutional Barriers?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Synnøve Thomassen Andersen

2012-01-01

Full Text Available The paper addresses an ICT-based, user-driven innovation process in the health sector in rural areas in Norway. The empirical base is the introduction of a new model for psychiatric health provision. This model is supported by a technical solution based on mobile phones that is aimed to help the communication between professional health personnel and patients. This innovation was made possible through the use of standard mobile technology rather than more sophisticated systems. The users were heavily involved in the development work. Our analysis shows that by thinking simple and small-scale solutions, including to take the user’s needs and premises as a point of departure rather than focusing on advanced technology, the implementation process was made possible. We show that by combining theory on information infrastructures, user-oriented system development, and innovation in a three-layered analytical framework, we can explain the interrelationship between technical, organizational, and health professional factors that made this innovation a success.

Mutual learning and reverse innovation--where next?

Science.gov (United States)

Crisp, Nigel

2014-03-28

There is a clear and evident need for mutual learning in global health systems. It is increasingly recognized that innovation needs to be sourced globally and that we need to think in terms of co-development as ideas are developed and spread from richer to poorer countries and vice versa. The Globalization and Health journal's ongoing thematic series, "Reverse innovation in global health systems: learning from low-income countries" illustrates how mutual learning and ideas about so-called "reverse innovation" or "frugal innovation" are being developed and utilized by researchers and practitioners around the world. The knowledge emerging from the series is already catalyzing change and challenging the status quo in global health. The path to truly "global innovation flow", although not fully established, is now well under way. Mobilization of knowledge and resources through continuous communication and awareness raising can help sustain this movement. Global health learning laboratories, where partners can support each other in generating and sharing lessons, have the potential to construct solutions for the world. At the heart of this dialogue is a focus on creating practical local solutions and, simultaneously, drawing out the lessons for the whole world.

HIMSS Venture+ Forum and HX360 Provide Industry View of Health Technology Innovation, Startup and Investment Activity; Advancing the New Model of Care.

Science.gov (United States)

Burde, Howard A; Scarfo, Richard

2015-01-01

Presented by HIMSS, the Venture+ Forum program and pitch competition provides a 360-degree view on health technology investing and today's top innovative companies. It features exciting 3-minute pitch presentations from emerging and growth-stage companies, investor panels and a networking reception. Recent Venture+ Forum winners include TowerView Health, Prima-Temp, ActuaiMeds and M3 Clinician. As an industry catalyst for health IT innovation and business-building resource for growing companies and emerging technology solutions, HIMSS has co-developed with A VIA, a new initiative that addresses how emerging technologies, health system business model changes and investment will transform the delivery of care. HX360 engages senior healthcare leaders, innovation teams, investors and entrepreneurs around the vision of transforming healthcare delivery by leveraging technology, process and structure.

Innovation and the English National Health Service: a qualitative study of the independent sector treatment centre programme.

Science.gov (United States)

Turner, Simon; Allen, Pauline; Bartlett, Will; Pérotin, Virginie

2011-08-01

Over the past two decades, an international trend of exposing public health services to different forms of economic organisation has emerged. In the English National Health Service (NHS), care is currently provided through a quasi-market including 'diverse' providers from the private and third sector. The predominant scheme through which private sector companies have been awarded NHS contracts is the Independent Sector Treatment Centre (ISTC) programme. ISTCs were designed to produce innovative models of service delivery for elective care and stimulate innovation among incumbent NHS providers. This paper investigates these claims using qualitative data on the impact of an ISTC upon a local health economy (LHE) composed of NHS organisations in England. Using the case of elective orthopaedic surgery, we conducted semi-structured interviews with senior managers from incumbent NHS providers and an ISTC in 2009. We show that ISTCs exhibit a different relationship with frontline clinicians because they counteract the power of professional communities associated with the NHS. This has positive and negative consequences for innovation. ISTCs have introduced new routines unencumbered by the extant norms of professional communities, but they appear to represent weaker learning environments and do not reproduce cooperation across organisational boundaries to the same extent as incumbent NHS providers. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Telemedicine in the acute health setting: A disruptive innovation for specialists (an example from stroke).

Science.gov (United States)

Bagot, Kathleen L; Cadilhac, Dominique A; Vu, Michelle; Moss, Karen; Bladin, Christopher F

2015-12-01

Telemedicine is a disruptive innovation within health care settings as consultations take place via audio-visual technology rather than traditional face-to-face. Specialist perceptions and experiences of providing audio-visual consultations in emergency situations, however, are not well understood. The aim of this exploratory study was to describe the experience of medical specialists providing acute stroke decision-making support via telemedicine. Data from the Victorian Stroke Telemedicine (VST) programme were used. The experiences of specialists providing an acute clinical telemedicine service to rural emergency departments were explored, drawing on disruptive innovation theory. Document analysis of programme consultation records, meeting minutes and in-depth individual interviews with three neurologists were analysed using triangulation. Since February 2014, 269 stroke telemedicine consultations with 12 neurologists have occurred. Retention on the roster has varied between 1 and >4 years. Overall, neurologists reported benefits of participation, as they were addressing health equity gaps for rural patients. Negative effects were the unpredictability of consultations impacting on their personal life, the mixed level of experience of colleagues initiating the consult and not knowing patient outcomes since follow-up communication was not routine. Insights into workforce experience and satisfaction were identified to inform strategies to support specialists to adapt to the disruptive innovation of telemedicine. © The Author(s) 2015.

Diffusion of innovation in women's health care delivery: the Department of Veterans Affairs' adoption of women's health clinics.

Science.gov (United States)

Yano, Elizabeth M; Goldzweig, Caroline; Canelo, Ismelda; Washington, Donna L

2006-01-01

In response to concerns about the availability and quality of women's health services in Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) medical centers in the early 1990s, Congress approved landmark legislation earmarking funds to enhance women's health services. A portion of the appropriation was used to launch Comprehensive Women's Health Centers as exemplars for the development of VA women's health care throughout the system. We report on the diffusion and characteristics of VA women's health clinics (WHCs) 10 years later. In 2001, we surveyed the senior women's health clinician at each VA medical center serving > or =400 women veterans (83% response rate) regarding their internal organizational characteristics in relation to factors associated with organizational innovation (centralization, complexity, formalization, interconnectedness, organizational slack, size). We evaluated the comparability of WHCs (n = 66) with characteristics of the original comprehensive women's health centers (CWHCs; n = 8). Gender-specific service availability in WHCs was comparable to that of CWHCs with important exceptions in mental health, mammography and osteoporosis management. WHCs were less likely to have same-gender providers (p business case for managers faced with small female patient caseloads.

The health policy pathfinder: an innovative strategy to explore interest group politics.

Science.gov (United States)

Nannini, Angela

2009-10-01

Moving a specific nursing health policy agenda forward depends on skill in building coalitions with other interest or stakeholder groups, including consumers. Often, nursing students study health policy in a discipline-specific environment without experiential opportunities to argue their views with other stakeholders in policy arenas. The health policy pathfinder, an innovative learning strategy for understanding interest group politics, will assist nursing students in meeting the following objectives: 1) analyze and articulate diverse policy arguments from various stakeholder groups; 2) identify opportunities for collaborations between stakeholder groups; 3) identify the influence of interest groups on the policy making process; and 4) critically evaluate evidence from a variety of sources ranging from peer-reviewed publications to grey literature to Internet blogs. This article describes the health policy pathfinder, including design, execution, and evaluation steps, and provides a brief excerpt from a student pathfinder. Copyright 2009, SLACK Incorporated.

Innovative Approaches in Chronic Disease Management: Health Literacy Solutions and Opportunities for Research Validation.

Science.gov (United States)

Villaire, Michael; Gonzalez, Diana Peña; Johnson, Kirby L

2017-01-01

This chapter discusses the need for innovative health literacy solutions to combat extensive chronic disease prevalence and costs. The authors explore the intersection of chronic disease management and health literacy. They provide specific examples of successful health literacy interventions for managing several highly prevalent chronic diseases. This is followed by suggestions on pairing research and practice to support effective disease management programs. In addition, the authors discuss strategies for collection and dissemination of knowledge gained from collaborations between researchers and practitioners. They identify current challenges specific to disseminating information from the health literacy field and offer potential solutions. The chapter concludes with a brief look at future directions and organizational opportunities to integrate health literacy practices to address the need for effective chronic disease management.

Qualitative assessment of innovations in healthcare provision

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ghosh Amit K

2009-03-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background The triad of quality, innovation and economic restraint is as important in health care as it is in the business world. There are many proposals for the assessment of quality and of economic restraints in health care but only a few address assessment of innovations. We propose a strategy and new structures to standardize the description of health care innovations and to quantify them. Discussion Strategy and structure are based on the assumption that in the early phase of an innovation only data on the feasibility and possibly on the efficacy or effectiveness of an innovation can be expected. From the patient's perspective, benefit resulting from an innovation can be confirmed only in a later phase of development. Early indicators of patient's benefit will be surrogate parameters which correlate only weakly with the desired endpoints. After the innovation has been in use, there will be more evidence on correlations between surrogate parameters and the desired endpoints to provide evidence of the patient benefit. From an administrative perspective, this evidence can be considered in decisions about public financing. Different criteria are proposed for the assessment of innovations in prevention, diagnosis and therapy. For decisions on public financing a public fund for innovations may be helpful. Depending on the phase of innovation risk sharing models are proposed between manufacturers, private insurers and public funding. Summary Potential for patient benefit is always uncertain during early stages of innovations. This uncertainty decreases with increasing information on the effects of the innovation. Information about an innovation can be quantified, categorized and integrated into rational economic decisions.

House Parties: An Innovative Model for Outreach and Community-Based Health Education.

Science.gov (United States)

Anderson-Reeves, Timika; Goodman, Jacqueline; Bragg, Brian; Leruth, Chelsey

2017-12-01

Purpose To connect low resource communities to innovative services that address gaps in health access and knowledge. Description We describe the house party model, as a community-based workshop approach to health education developed by the Westside Healthy Start program (WHS) in Chicago, Illinois. Key elements of the WHS house party model include use of community health workers as facilitators, collaboration with participants and community-based organizations, referrals to health care and social services, and engagement strategies such as interactive activities, personal stories, and discussion. Assessment In 2014 and 2015, WHS completed 23 house parties with 271 participants, delivering education on relevant maternal and child health (MCH) topics. Participants demonstrated improvements in knowledge of several health-related areas. About half of participants were able to identify causes or signs of preterm labor prior to the house party, compared to over 80% after. In addition, 94% of participants rated the house party workshops "excellent" or "good". Conclusion House parties are a promising strategy for increasing knowledge about MCH topics and linking hard-to-reach populations to resources in the community.

Chapter 10. Professional migration from Latin America and the Caribbean

OpenAIRE

2013-01-01

From NGO to multilateral organisation and government involvement: three case studiesFernando Lema Executive summary In this chapter we present three case studies of the Latin American diaspora: one on the experience of non-profit organisations (NGO) in France (AFUDEST and ALAS), one on work in an international organisation (UNESCO) and one about field work with a government agency, Argentina's Secretariat for Science, Technology and Productive Innovation (SETCIP). The three experiences took p...

EVALUATION CRITERIA OF INNOVATIVE SOCIAL INVESTMENT PROJECTS IN HEALTH CARE

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Vadim Aleksandrovich Lomazov

2013-11-01

Full Text Available Purpose: analysis of key indicators and creation of evaluation criteria of innovative socio-economic investment projects in healthcare, implemented on the basis of public-private partnerships.Methodology: there has been performed comprehensive assessment of specialized socio-economic projects in health sector taking into consideration interests of participants in the project (public and private, main aspects (medical, social, economic, scientific and innovative, and assessment components (presumable effectiveness or risk during implementation of the project. The degree of relative importance of the factors considered in each level, and the levels themselves are determined by experts with the help of paired comparisons method. The values of the project indicators are estimated against nonuniform grading scale, both the results of direct measurements and expert information being used.Results: There has been suggested an approach and a procedure for evaluating projects based on the allocation of interests, issues and evaluation components of the project as sub-criteria levels of the hierarchy analysis method; there has been developed research prototype of information analysis system for assessment of projects on the basis of the proposed approach.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.12731/2218-7405-2013-8-48

Reviewing the Nutrition and Health Claims Regulation (EC) No. 1924/2006: What do we know about its challenges and potential impact on innovation?

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Bröring, Stefanie; Khedkar, Sukhada; Ciliberti, Stefano

2017-02-01

Health claims potentially represent an opportunity for firms to engage in product differentiation and thereby induce investment into R&D and innovation in the food sector. The Nutrition and Health Claims Regulation (EC) No. 1924/2006 (NHCR) aims at protecting and promoting innovation as one of its objectives. However, existing studies indicate that this regulation may create several challenges for innovation in the food sector. To this end, we review the challenges related to the NHCR (Article 13.1) and its impact on innovation. Extant literature suggests that companies face challenges related to changing list of ingredients, missing transparency, wording of claims, limited financial resources, limited R&D resources, switching product categories and abandoning the functional foods sector. Moreover, current studies imply that so far the NHCR (in specific Article 13.1) does not seem to encourage innovation in the EU food sector.

Assessment and diffusion of medical innovations in France: an overview.

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Dubromel, Amélie; Geffroy, Loïc; Aulagner, Gilles; Dussart, Claude

2018-01-01

Background: In France, a significant part of health expenditure is publicly funding. This put a heavy burden on society. In an economic context requiring tight control of public spending, it seems relevant to control the diffusion of medical innovations. That is why health technology assessment is subject to an increasing interest at national level for management and approval decisions. This article provides an overview of the assessment and diffusion of medical innovation in France. Method: The data are extracted from French authorities or organisations websites and documents and from French legislative texts. In addition, regarding discussion, a search in MEDLINE database was carried out. Results: An overview of the assessment and diffusion of medical innovation in France is given by presenting the different types of medical innovations according to French health system definition (I); introducing French authorities participating to health technology assessment and describe assessment procedures of medical innovations (II); and giving details about market access process of innovative health product in France (III). Key opportunities and challenges of medical innovation assessment and diffusion in France are discussed at the end of this article. Conclusion: In France, medical innovation is considered as a crucial component for quality of care and performance of healthcare system. The aim of health technology assessment is to promote a secure and timely access to innovation for patients. Nevertheless, it appears necessary to improve regulatory mechanisms.

Surgical innovation: the ethical agenda: A systematic review.

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Broekman, Marike L; Carrière, Michelle E; Bredenoord, Annelien L

2016-06-01

The aim of the present article was to systematically review the ethics of surgical innovation and introduce the components of the learning health care system to guide future research and debate on surgical innovation.Although the call for evidence-based practice in surgery is increasingly high on the agenda, most surgeons feel that the format of the randomized controlled trial is not suitable for surgery. Innovation in surgery has aspects of, but should be distinguished from both research and clinical care and raises its own ethical challenges.To answer the question "What are the main ethical aspects of surgical innovation?", we systematically searched PubMed and Embase. Papers expressing an opinion, point of view, or position were included, that is, normative ethical papers.We included 59 studies discussing ethical aspects of surgical innovation. These studies discussed 4 major themes: oversight, informed consent, learning curve, and vulnerable patient groups. Although all papers addressed the ethical challenges raised by surgical innovation, surgeons hold no uniform view of surgical innovation, and there is no agreement on the distinction between innovation and research. Even though most agree to some sort of oversight, they offer different alternatives ranging from the formation of new surgical innovation committees to establishing national registries. Most agree that informed consent is necessary for innovative procedures and that surgeons should be adequately trained to assure their competence to tackle the learning curve problem. All papers agree that in case of vulnerable patients, alternatives must be found for the informed consent procedure.We suggest that the concept of the learning health care system might provide guidance for thinking about surgical innovation. The underlying rationale of the learning health care system is to improve the quality of health care by embedding research within clinical care. Two aspects of a learning health care system might

The Psychology School Mental Health Initiative: An Innovative Approach to the Delivery of School-Based Intervention Services

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Millar, Golden M.; Lean, Debra; Sweet, Susan D.; Moraes, Sabrina C.; Nelson, Victoria

2013-01-01

Evidence suggests that schools have, by default, become the primary mental health system for students in Canada. The goal of the present study was to design, implement, and evaluate the Psychology School Mental Health Initiative (PSMHI). The PSMHI is an innovative attempt to increase the capacity of school-based psychology staff to deliver…

Implementing complex innovations: factors influencing middle manager support.

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Chuang, Emmeline; Jason, Kendra; Morgan, Jennifer Craft

2011-01-01

Middle manager resistance is often described as a major challenge for upper-level administrators seeking to implement complex innovations such as evidence-based protocols or new skills training. However, factors influencing middle manager support for innovation implementation are currently understudied in the U.S. health care literature. This article examined the factors that influence middle managers' support for and participation in the implementation of work-based learning, a complex innovation adopted by health care organizations to improve the jobs, educational pathways, skills, and/or credentials of their frontline workers. We conducted semistructured interviews and focus groups with 92 middle managers in 17 health care organizations. Questions focused on understanding middle managers' support for work-based learning as a complex innovation, facilitators and barriers to the implementation process, and the systems changes needed to support the implementation of this innovation. Factors that emerged as influential to middle manager support were similar to those found in broader models of innovation implementation within the health care literature. However, our findings extend previous research by developing an understanding about how middle managers perceived these constructs and by identifying specific strategies for how to influence middle manager support for the innovation implementation process. These findings were generally consistent across different types of health care organizations. Study findings suggest that middle manager support was highest when managers felt the innovation fit their workplace needs and priorities and when they had more discretion and control over how it was implemented. Leaders seeking to implement innovations should consider the interplay between middle managers' control and discretion, their narrow focus on the performance of their own departments or units, and the dedication of staff and other resources for empowering their

Navy-NGO Coordination for Health-Related HCA Missions: A Suggested Planning Framework

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2008-11-01

COCOMs have plans for several more de- ployments in the coming years. In 2006, USNS Mercy, a hospital ship with a white-painted hull bear - ing a large...facilities and health care equipment, medicines and vaccines, such health aides as eyeglasses and walking sticks, large-scale water purifi- cation systems

Use of information and communication technologies to support effective work practice innovation in the health sector: a multi-site study

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Georgiou Andrew

2009-11-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Widespread adoption of information and communication technologies (ICT is a key strategy to meet the challenges facing health systems internationally of increasing demands, rising costs, limited resources and workforce shortages. Despite the rapid increase in ICT investment, uptake and acceptance has been slow and the benefits fewer than expected. Absent from the research literature has been a multi-site investigation of how ICT can support and drive innovative work practice. This Australian-based project will assess the factors that allow health service organisations to harness ICT, and the extent to which such systems drive the creation of new sustainable models of service delivery which increase capacity and provide rapid, safe, effective, affordable and sustainable health care. Design A multi-method approach will measure current ICT impact on workforce practices and develop and test new models of ICT use which support innovations in work practice. The research will focus on three large-scale commercial ICT systems being adopted in Australia and other countries: computerised ordering systems, ambulatory electronic medical record systems, and emergency medicine information systems. We will measure and analyse each system's role in supporting five key attributes of work practice innovation: changes in professionals' roles and responsibilities; integration of best practice into routine care; safe care practices; team-based care delivery; and active involvement of consumers in care. Discussion A socio-technical approach to the use of ICT will be adopted to examine and interpret the workforce and organisational complexities of the health sector. The project will also focus on ICT as a potentially disruptive innovation that challenges the way in which health care is delivered and consequently leads some health professionals to view it as a threat to traditional roles and responsibilities and a risk to existing models of care

Use of information and communication technologies to support effective work practice innovation in the health sector: a multi-site study.

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Westbrook, Johanna I; Braithwaite, Jeffrey; Gibson, Kathryn; Paoloni, Richard; Callen, Joanne; Georgiou, Andrew; Creswick, Nerida; Robertson, Louise

2009-11-08

Widespread adoption of information and communication technologies (ICT) is a key strategy to meet the challenges facing health systems internationally of increasing demands, rising costs, limited resources and workforce shortages. Despite the rapid increase in ICT investment, uptake and acceptance has been slow and the benefits fewer than expected. Absent from the research literature has been a multi-site investigation of how ICT can support and drive innovative work practice. This Australian-based project will assess the factors that allow health service organisations to harness ICT, and the extent to which such systems drive the creation of new sustainable models of service delivery which increase capacity and provide rapid, safe, effective, affordable and sustainable health care. A multi-method approach will measure current ICT impact on workforce practices and develop and test new models of ICT use which support innovations in work practice. The research will focus on three large-scale commercial ICT systems being adopted in Australia and other countries: computerised ordering systems, ambulatory electronic medical record systems, and emergency medicine information systems. We will measure and analyse each system's role in supporting five key attributes of work practice innovation: changes in professionals' roles and responsibilities; integration of best practice into routine care; safe care practices; team-based care delivery; and active involvement of consumers in care. A socio-technical approach to the use of ICT will be adopted to examine and interpret the workforce and organisational complexities of the health sector. The project will also focus on ICT as a potentially disruptive innovation that challenges the way in which health care is delivered and consequently leads some health professionals to view it as a threat to traditional roles and responsibilities and a risk to existing models of care delivery. Such views have stifled debate as well as wider

Advancing innovations in social/personality psychology and health: opportunities and challenges.

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Rothman, Alexander J; Klein, William M P; Cameron, Linda D

2013-05-01

Social, personality, and health psychologists have a long tradition of active and productive collaborations that have advanced the development of intervention strategies that promote health and well-being and the specification of the theoretical principles that underlie those strategies. This special issue is designed to continue this tradition of collaboration and to highlight areas of research and investigative strategies that offer opportunities for innovation. This concluding paper examines how investigators construe the interface between theory and practice and, with that lens, considers several themes that have emerged across the papers that comprise this special issue. As evidenced by the papers in this special issue, investigators are well-positioned to leverage advances in understanding of human health and well-being. However, to capitalize on this opportunity, investigators need to commit to cultivating a culture of scientific activity that prioritizes the engagement of theory and practice-the pursuit of both understanding and use. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved.

From strategy to action: how top managers' support increases middle managers' commitment to innovation implementation in health care organizations.

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Birken, Sarah A; Lee, Shoou-Yih Daniel; Weiner, Bryan J; Chin, Marshall H; Chiu, Michael; Schaefer, Cynthia T

2015-01-01

Evidence suggests that top managers' support influences middle managers' commitment to innovation implementation. What remains unclear is how top managers' support influences middle managers' commitment. Results may be used to improve dismal rates of innovation implementation. We used a mixed-method sequential design. We surveyed (n = 120) and interviewed (n = 16) middle managers implementing an innovation intended to reduce health disparities in 120 U.S. health centers to assess whether top managers' support directly influences middle managers' commitment; by allocating implementation policies and practices; or by moderating the influence of implementation policies and practices on middle managers' commitment. For quantitative analyses, multivariable regression assessed direct and moderated effects; a mediation model assessed mediating effects. We used template analysis to assess qualitative data. We found support for each hypothesized relationship: Results suggest that top managers increase middle managers' commitment by directly conveying to middle managers that innovation implementation is an organizational priority (β = 0.37, p = .09); allocating implementation policies and practices including performance reviews, human resources, training, and funding (bootstrapped estimate for performance reviews = 0.09; 95% confidence interval [0.03, 0.17]); and encouraging middle managers to leverage performance reviews and human resources to achieve innovation implementation. Top managers can demonstrate their support directly by conveying to middle managers that an initiative is an organizational priority, allocating implementation policies and practices such as human resources and funding to facilitate innovation implementation, and convincing middle managers that innovation implementation is possible using available implementation policies and practices. Middle managers may maximize the influence of top managers' support on their commitment by communicating with top