Disability-Competent Health Systems

Building competent reflective systems

A competent system need not be perfect. It should not try to solve unsolvable problems. Rather it should simplify and decompose overcomplex problems, complement missing information, weight the quality of a solution against the cost of achieving it, approximate solutions if time is sparse, etc. To make a knowledge-based system more competent, we propose to enhance it by suitable competence speci...

Strengthening health information systems for disability-related rehabilitation in LMICs

The purpose of this study was to describe the state of rehabilitation health information systems (HIS) in different settings, and identify key processes and actions which contribute to the development of HIS which can effectively support low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) allocate resources to health-related rehabilitation to people with disabilities. Nine case studies were conducted acro...

Disability and Oral Health

Measuring health and disability.

Disability-adjusted life years (DALYs)—a frequent indicator for assessment of the relative eff ects of public-health interventions—explicitly incorporate disability. This Viewpoint will argue, however, that the notion of disability embodied in DALYs does not accord with that in WHO’s International Classifi cation of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF). Underlying this inconsistency is the...

Culturally competent healthcare systems. A systematic review.

Culturally competent healthcare systems-those that provide culturally and linguistically appropriate services-have the potential to reduce racial and ethnic health disparities. When clients do not understand what their healthcare providers are telling them, and providers either do not speak the client's language or are insensitive to cultural differences, the quality of health care can be compr...