Posted 11/07/2017. We used a qualitative approach to study how public hospitals in Kenya make resource allocation decisions. We found that these decisions were influenced by (1) scarcity of financial resources, and poorly designed financing processes, (2) limited flexibility in resource allocation decisions, and (3) inadequate management and leadership capacity in the hospitals. Read more on Improving priority settting practices in Kenya's hospitals.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 18/08/2017. Malaria transmission is patchy at local levels, and when a group of houses is located in a high transmission patch this is labelled a \"hotspot\". Looking at 19 studies in 7 African Countries, we see that hotspots are the norm, and especially prominent when malaria transmission falls.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 01/08/2017. For more than a decade, Professor Mike English and his team have worked with the Kenyan Ministry of Health and professionals to develop national clinical guidelines. This paper describes how this approach has become both more rigorous and more collaborative while offering lessons to other LMIC on how to develop high quality guidelines with limited resources.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 08/09/2017. Changing the practices of health care workers in multiple hospitals in low-income settings is a major contemporary challenge that requires people to think about the complex set of influences that affect clinicians\u2019 behaviour. In this report, Professor Mike English describes a multi-layered strategy utilising a new implementation typology linked to overarching theories of change.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 10/10/2017. Severe malnutrition remains common in low-income countries, principally among young children. It usually arises from poor sanitation and infections, besides food insecurity. This comprehensive review by Professor James Berkley describes how research is needed, using modern clinic and laboratory tools, to better understand changes in metabolism, infections and the immune system to improve treatment.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 07/11/2017. Bioinformatics skills have become essential for many research areas and building these skills has many challenges. Dr Etienne de Villiers and colleagues develop the eBioKit as a stand-alone bioinformatics educational and research platform that hosts numerous tools and databases for both bioinformatics research and training in a controlled environment
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 31/10/2017. Antimicrobial resistance is a clear and present threat to international health. Dr Phoebe Williams and Professor Jay Berkley reviewed recent data on antimicrobial resistance among children in sub-Saharan Africa since 2005. Research needs to focus on reporting community versus hospital-acquired infections, including patient outcomes, and needs pragmatic clinical trials.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 30/01/2018. Podoconiosis, also known as nonfilarial elephantiasis, is a poorly understood neglected tropical disease. Using a combination of currently available epidemiological data as well as nationwide mapping survey and geostatistical modelling, Dr Abdisalan Noor and colleagues demonstrated that podoconiosis is highly endemic in Ethiopia and interventions need to be scaled-up rapidly.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 23/01/2018. The search is on for good measures of healthcare quality as LMIC health systems focus on effective coverage. In a new publication the Health Services team in Nairobi recently validated the Paediatric Admission Quality of Care (PAQC) score they had earlier developed, showing higher quality scores were associated with lower mortality for hospitalised children in Kenya.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 06/02/2018. Timely access to emergency care can substantially reduce mortality. Work undertaken in Professor Bob Snow\u2019s group in Kenya, has developed the first ever geocoded inventory of public hospitals in Africa. Spatial analysis across 48 countries showed that 29% of people are located more than 2-h travel time from the nearest hospital. With substantial variations within and between countries, innovative targeting of emergency care services is necessary to reduce inequities.
\n \n\n \n \nPosted 22/05/2018. A new Case Study by Naomi Muinga from the Global Health Informatics Group reports on the challenges faced implementing an Open Source Electronic Health Record system in Kenya and the strategies employed by the Ministry of Health and development teams for increasing user adoption as the system is scaled up.
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