Saffron, as one of the most expensive agricultural product around the world, has an important place among Iran’s non-oil exports. Therefore, it is important to solve the problems in Iran's saffron industry as the world’s largest saffron producer. Thus, this study attempts to identify the challenges that directly and indirectly affect the saffron industry and cause stagnation. The challenges...

BACKGROUND The creation of successful health policy and location of resources increasingly relies on evidence-based decision-making. The development of intuitive, accessible tools to analyse, display and disseminate spatial data potentially provides the basis for sound policy and resource allocation decisions. As health services are rationalized, the development of tools such graphical user int...

Those making health care coverage decisions rely on health technology assessment (HTA) for crucial technical information. But coverage decision-making, and the HTA that informs it, are also inherently political. They involve the values and judgments of a range of stakeholders as well as the public. Moreover, governments are politically accountable for their resource allocation decisions. Canadi...

Saffron, as one of the most expensive agricultural product around the world, has an important place among Iran’s non-oil exports. Therefore, it is important to solve the problems in Iran's saffron industry as the world’s largest saffron producer. Thus, this study attempts to identify the challenges that directly and indirectly affect the saffron industry and cause stagnation. The challenges...

The objective of this empirical study was to understand the perspectives and attitudes of policy-makers towards the use and impact of research in the health sector in low- and middle-income countries. The study used data from 83 semi-structured, in-depth interviews conducted with purposively selected policy-makers at the national level in Argentina, Egypt, Iran, Malawi, Oman and Singapore. The ...

Participants in the Cochrane Collaboration conduct and periodically update systematic reviews that address the question, “What works?” for healthcare interventions. The Cochrane Library makes available quality-appraised systematic reviews that address this question. No coordinated effort has been undertaken to conduct and periodically update systematic reviews that address the other types of qu...

The purpose of this paper is to explore how rationing decisions are made by government and hospital policy makers and practitioners, at the micro, meso and macro levels of analysis, through examining the rationing of cardiac care in a Canadian hospital, and discussing how the interaction between policy makers and practitioners at each of these levels affects the process and outcomes. Data were ...

Background The World Health Organization (WHO) has developed the Total System Effectiveness (TSE) framework to assist national policy-makers in prioritizing vaccines. The pilot was launched in Thailand to explore the potential use of TSE in a country with established governance structures and accountable decision-making processes fo...