Last week, we introduced a new weekly blog series called “In Case You Missed It.” This blog series is a roundup of news items and developments from the previous week that I found interesting and would like to share.
A representative from a women’s organization in Ethiopia describes how Community Based Health Insurance improves women’s lives.
Sales in the United States of the Hepatitis C drug Sovaldi exceed ten billion dollars last year. How Hepatitis C is Shining a Light on Critical Gaps in Payment Reform
Ethiopia Scales Up Community Based Health Insurance
This is an interesting analysis of the issues with physician payment adjustments under Medicare in the United States. It is from the Brookings Institution. The recommendations for how to address the issues are valuable. A Primer on Medicare Physician Payment Reform and the Sustainable Growth Rate
ACCESS Health India Country Manager Siddhartha Bhattacharya forwarded this link on the Smart City initiative in India. I draw your attention to the concept note on Smart Cities highlighted in red on the introductory page. It is a description of what a smart city might mean in an Indian context. To my mind, there is not enough attention paid to health infrastructure and manpower, about twenty percent of all real urban activities, and even less attention paid to the needs of the elderly and chronically ill. I welcome your comments. Smart Cities – Transforming Life – Transforming India
Please see this interesting article on the integration of community health workers into an integrated health management team. Bringing Community Health Workers into the Mainstream of the US Healthcare
A very interesting application, potentially adaptable to many other diseases. It will be interesting to discover how robust the backend analytics are that could allow the user to understand the results and a health service to integrate them into a medical record. Does anyone know how much each test costs? The “dongle” may cost thirty four dollars, but the each test will also have a price. Thirty Four Dollar Smartphone Accessory Detects HIV, Syphilis Antibodies
Please see this editorial on health in the aging world from the Lancet. Health system need to adapt. This is one of the topics we work on at ACCESS Health. Health in an Aging World-What Do We Know?
A candid and valuable view of the strengths and weaknesses of the Canadian healthcare system. Bottom line: the author does not believe that the current system needs structural reform to meet the needs of the population and to take advantage of modern medical practice. It makes interesting reading. A System in Name Only – Access, Variation, and Reform in Canada’s Provinces
An important article for out team working on quality improvement. Improvement in quality is hard but must be done. The author closes the article with some useful recommendations. Hospital Readmissions Following Surgery: Turning Complications Into “Treasures”
These three articles and the additional review by Donald Berwick highlight the difficulty in quality improvement. Quality measurements are necessary. Evidently, knowing that results can be improved is not sufficient to change practice and improve outcomes. One author quotes an African proverb, “Weighing a pig does not make it fatter!” Underlying Reasons Associated With Hospital Readmission Following Surgery in the United States, Association of Hospital Participation in a Quality Reporting Program With Surgical Outcomes and Expenditures for Medicare Beneficiaries, Association of Hospital Participation in a Surgical Outcomes Monitoring Program With Inpatient Complications and Mortality, and Donald Berwick: Measuring Surgical Outcomes for Improvement
This report is of interest to our teams working on primary health, community health, and maternal and child care. Empowering Women and Strengthening Health Systems and Services Through Investing in Nursing and Midwifery Enterprise: Lessons From Lower Income Countries