BACKGROUND The cornerstone of the health system in Zimbabwe, the district health system has been under the responsibility of the district health executive since 1984. Preliminary information obtained from some provincial health managers in Midlands Province suggested a poor performance by most district health executives. We therefore investigated the reasons for this poor performance. METHODS...

The Affordable Care Act prohibited insurers from denying or limiting cover­age for children under the age of 19 in 2010. In response, some insurers ceased to offer coverage to children in need of individual health insurance, known as a "child-only" pol­icy. This issue brief examines new state legislative and regulatory action to promote the availability of child-only policies in response to thi...

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) asks that states " restructure " schools that fail for six years running to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) toward full proficiency on the part of all students by the year 2014. According to the legislation, restructuring may entail the transformation of the school into a charter school, the shift of management to a private entity (either for-profit or non-profit...

BACKGROUND Despite rapid and tangible progress in vaccine coverage and in premature mortality rates registered in sub-Saharan Africa, inequities to access remain firmly entrenched, large pockets of low vaccination coverage persist, and coverage often varies considerably across regions, districts, and health facilities' areas of responsibility. This paper focuses on system-related factors that c...

The market-oriented health care reforms taking place in the Netherlands show a clear resemblance to the proposals for managed competition in U.S. health care. In both countries good risk adjustment mechanisms that prevent cream skimming--that is, that prevent plans from selecting the best health risks--are critical to the success of the reforms. In this paper we present an overview of the Dutch...

BACKGROUND Despite significant investments and reforms, health care remains poor for many in Africa. To design an intervention to improve access and quality of health care at health facilities in eastern Uganda, we aimed to understand local priorities for qualities in health care, and factors that enable or prevent these qualities from being enacted. METHODS In 2009 to 2010, we carried out 69...

New Zealand's health sector has undergone three significant restructures within 10 years. The most recent has involved a Primary Health Care Strategy, launched in 2001. Primary Health Organisations (PHOs), administered by 21 District Health Boards, are the local structures for implementing the Primary Health Care Strategy. Ninety-three percent of the New Zealand population is now enrolled withi...

• • The views expressed in this report are those of the authors. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The report synthesizes the evidence and theoretical predictions regarding the potential of several leading medical malpractice reform ideas to positively affect the performance of the medical liability system and its impact on health care delivery. For most reforms, the report analyzes evidence from well‐designed...

In this review, we summarize and review reforms to the mental health service in the United Kingdom from 1999 to the present. Our analysis is based on government documents describing the reforms and providing guidelines for their implementation. In addition, we summarize prospective studies of psychosis from the first episode and early treatment studies on the basis of existing systematic review...

in recent years, the main focus of health sector reforms in iran is the family physician and referral system plan. fundamental changes in the goals and strategies, has increased the necessity of the need to reform the organizational structure. this study tries to review and summarize all cases about the organizational structure of iran and its challenges in primary health care system.this study...