Background & objectives: Vaccination coverage in India is far from complete despite the commitment to universal coverage. In this study, we examine the role of health infrastructure in expanding immunization coverage in rural India. Our approach differs from prior work in that we include detailed measures of village health infrastructure that account for the wide variations in health care capab...

BACKGROUND Pakistan has high maternal mortality, particularly in the rural areas. The delay in decision making to seek medical care during obstetric emergencies remains a significant factor in maternal mortality. METHODS We present results from an experimental study in rural Pakistan. Village clusters were randomly assigned to intervention and control arms (16 clusters each). In the intervent...

Introduction The tourism industry can provide a good platform for investment, and because of its less reliance on resources, provides an opportunity for less developed countries to stimulate their economic growth to increase production and create job opportunities. Meanwhile, the villages have very favorable and special conditions in accordance with their cultural, social, economic, geographic...

BACKGROUND Rural healthcare facilities in low-income countries play a major role in providing primary care to rural populations. We examined the link of foreign aid with government investments and medical service provision in rural health centres in Rwanda. METHODS Using the District Health System Strengthening Tool, a web-based database built by the Ministry of Health in Rwanda, we construct...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE Equality in distribution of health care facilities is the main cause for access and enjoyment to the health. The aim of this study was to examine the regional disparities in health care facilities across the Markazi province. METHODS This was a cross-sectional study. Study sample included the cities of Markazi province, ranked based on 15 health indices. Data was coll...

BACKGROUND Routine health data can guide health systems improvements, but poor quality of these data hinders use. To address concerns about data quality in Malawi, the Ministry of Health and National Statistical Office conducted a data quality assessment (DQA) in July 2016 to identify systems-level factors that could be improved. METHODS We used 2-stage stratified random sampling methods to s...

BACKGROUND Bangladesh is facing serious shortage of trained health professionals. In the pluralistic healthcare system of Bangladesh, formal health care providers constitute only 5 % of the total workforce; the rest are informal health care providers. Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) are increasingly seen as a powerful tool for linking the community with formal healthcare providers...

Development of infrastructure has not yet picked up due to variety of reasons in the states of North Eastern Region of the country. Because of inadequate road connectivity, particularly in rural areas, many areas with high development potential remain isolated from the main land and major portion of the common dwellers of these places get deprived of basic facilities like health care, education...