The revolution started without anybody realising it. The finding, by the Court of Justice of the European Union (the Court), that two Italian nationals, Mrs Luisi and Mr Carbone, were entitled to travel to another member state to receive health services – unrestrained by capital movement or other restrictions – hardly alarmed people in the health sector: Luisi and Carbone were over-the-border s...

OBJECTIVE As HIV/AIDS prevalence rises in Eastern Europe, assessment of local epidemics in the bordering Central European region, especially South Eastern Europe, is vital in order to meet treatment and prevention needs. Understanding current medical and social needs and barriers to care experienced by HIV-positive patients in these regions may provide insight into how to best respond to the lo...

There is an increasing policy emphasis on the integration of care, both within the healthcare sector and also between the health and social care sectors, with the simple aim of ensuring that individuals get the right care, in the right place, at the right time. However, implementing this simple aim is rather more complex. In this editorial, we seek to make sense of this complexity and ask: what...

The Brazilian Federal Constitution of 1988 established that health is “a duty of the State” and “a right of the citizen”. According to the law, every citizen is entitled to use the Brazilian Unified National Health System (Sistema Único de Saúde – SUS), in line with their social needs, regardless of their ability to pay, occupational status or health conditions. To ensure universal care, the St...

BACKGROUND Urban slums, like refugee communities, comprise a social cluster that engenders a distinct set of health problems. With 1 billion people currently estimated to live in such communities, this neglected population has become a major reservoir for a wide spectrum of health conditions that the formal health sector must deal with. DISCUSSION Unlike what occurs with refugee populations, ...

Professional bureaucracies of the Finnish municipal services are challenged by many modernization pressures manifested currently in the form of New Public Management. Along with efficiency demands the new emphasis is on the provision of client-oriented services by the means of multiprofessional teamwork crossing the traditional sector boundaries. This paper analyses the learning processes neede...

OBJECTIVES To estimate the excess cost of stroke in Sweden and the potential costs that could be avoided by preventing first-ever strokes. METHODS We adopted the incidence approach for estimating the present value of both direct and indirect costs. Data on mortality, stroke recurrence, and inpatient care were estimated from a national register of patient data with a four-year follow-up period...

The MANAS trial evaluated the effectiveness of a lay counselor led collaborative stepped care intervention for Common Mental Disorders (CMD) in public and private sector primary care settings in Goa, India. This paper describes the qualitative findings of the experience of the intervention and its impact on health and psychosocial outcomes. Twenty four primary care facilities (12 public and pri...

Throughout the 1990s, all Latin American countries but Cuba implemented to varying degrees health care sector reforms underpinned by a neoliberal paradigm that redefined health care as less of a social right and more of a market commodity. These health care sector reforms were couched in the broader structural adjustment of Latin American welfare states prescribed consistently by international ...

PURPOSE LIFEspan is a service delivery model of continuous coordinated care developed and implemented by a cross-organization partnership between a pediatric and an adult rehabilitation hospital. Previous work explored enablers and barriers to establishing the partnership service. This paper examines healthcare professionals' (HCPs') experiences of 'real world' service delivery aimed at support...