Purpose and context: ‘Gesundes Kinzigtal’ is one of the few population-based integrated care approaches in Germany, organising care across all health service sectors and indications. The management company and its contracting partners (the physicians’ network in the region and two statutory health insurers) strive to reach a higher quality of care at a lower overall cost as compared with the Ge...

BACKGROUND Previous studies have reported differing rates of consultation with GPs prior to suicide. Patients with a psychiatric history have higher rates of consultation and consult closer to the time of their death. AIM To investigate the frequency and nature of general practice consultations in the year before suicide for patients in current, or recent, contact with secondary mental health...

Urban-based randomized clinical trials of integrated supported employment (SE) and mental health services in the United States on average have doubled the employment rates of adults with severe mental illness (SMI) compared to traditional vocational rehabilitation. However, studies have not yet explored if the service integrative functions of SE will be effective in coordinating rural-based ser...

OBJECTIVE To develop and validate heart and respiratory rate percentile curves for hospitalized children and compare their vital sign distributions to textbook reference ranges and pediatric early warning score (EWS) parameters. METHODS For this cross-sectional study, we used 6 months of nurse-documented heart and respiratory rates from the electronic records of 14,014 children on general med...

BACKGROUND Dyspepsia is a chronic disease with significant impact on the use of health care resources. A management strategy based on Helicobacter pylori testing has been recommended but the long term effect is unknown. AIM To investigate the long term effect of a test and treat strategy compared with prompt endoscopy for management of dyspeptic patients in primary care. PATIENTS A total of...

BACKGROUND Oxygen therapy is recommended for all of the 1.5 - 2.7 million young children who consult health services with hypoxemic pneumonia each year, and the many more with other serious conditions. However, oxygen supplies are intermittent throughout the developing world. Although oxygen is well established as a treatment for hypoxemic pneumonia, quantitative evidence for its effect is lack...

BACKGROUND Geriatric patients recently discharged from hospital experience increased chance of unplanned readmissions and admission to nursing homes. Several studies have shown that medication-related discrepancies are common. Few studies report unwanted incidents by other factors than medications. In 2002 an ambulatory team (AT) was established within the Department of Geriatrics, St. Olavs Un...

BACKGROUND More than half of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected individuals in Kenya are unaware of their status, and young women carry a disproportionate burden of incident HIV infections. We sought to determine the effect of an SMS intervention on uptake of HIV testing among female Kenyan college students. METHODS We conducted a quasi-experimental study to increase HIV testing amon...

UNLABELLED BACKGROUND Infertility is a significant disability, yet there are no reliable estimates of its global prevalence. Studies on infertility prevalence define the condition inconsistently, rendering the comparison of studies or quantitative summaries of the literature difficult. This study analyzed key components of infertility to develop a definition that can be consistently applied ...