Health systems in South America still support segmentation, privatization and fragmentation. Health reforms of the structural adjustment programs in the 1980s and 1990s in South America followed different purposes and strategies ranging from privatization, commodification and state intervention for the implementation of a national public health service with universal access as a right of the ci...

To cite: Romero Reynó J, Castelló González M, Choonara I. Arch Dis Child 2015;100(Suppl 1):s70–s71. Central America consists of seven mainland countries: Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama. The Caribbean Sea contains over a thousand islands. Many of the islands are small in both size and population. The countries of Central America and the Caribbean with ...

While childhood immunisations are voluntary in the UK, healthcare staff strongly encourage uptake; this is endorsed by the Department of Health. While a few parents refuse immunisation outright, many more are uncertain about the risks and benefits. This uncertainty was exacerbated during the controversy over the mumps, measles and rubella vaccine. This prompted many studies exploring parents' v...

The shocked reaction of commentators to the recent Canadian Supreme Court decision (Chaoulli v. Quebec) overturning Quebec's ban on private healthcare insurance is difficult to square with the facts and policy options realistically open to provincial governments. The problem is that rhetoric has centred on preserving a single-tier universal system that has never existed in the form its supporte...

OBJECTIVE To analyze the efficiency of a school-based smoking prevention program in Barcelona (PASE.bcn program). METHODS A cost-benefit analysis was performed. As costs we included those corresponding to the design and implementation of the program. As benefits we considered healthcare costs and the productivity losses avoided. This study was conducted from a societal perspective, and the es...

The intelligent use of resources enabled by Internet of Things has raised the expectations of the technical as well as the consumer community. However there are many challenges in designing an IoT healthcare system, like security, authentication and exchanging data. The IoT healthcare system, is transforming everyday physical objects, medical devices that surround us into an embedded smart heal...

The nation’s healthcare system is in a transition of potentially historic proportions, driven by the need for cost-effectiveness under pressures of cost containment and competition, but also made possible by scientific and technological breakthroughs.1 This transition presents new challenges and opportunities for protecting the health and safety of our nation’s healthcare workers. Toward the go...

Background: Qatar, one of the smallest and wealthiest countries in the world, is a newly emerging healthcare system. Medical leadership in Qatar has had to create an infrastructure for medical care over the past twenty years. The purpose of this paper is to review the challenges and achievements of the newly emerging Qatar healthcare system. Methods: PubMed was searched using MESH terms: Qatar,...

Introduction In order to provide effective healthcare to the rural population, the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) by government of India proposed introduction of female health workers village level. These workers are called Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHA) and their role is to act at an interface between the community and the government healthcare services. More specifically, she...