Global Health Blog
Global Health Blog
- May 15, 2012
- The Changing Landscape of International Development: The Turbulent Journey Ahead
I recently had the honor of co-chairing InterAction Forum 2012 along with Carolyn Miles of Save the Children. This year’s Forum brought more than 1,000 representatives of InterAction’s member international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) together to listen to thought-provoking speakers, share ideas, and participate in conversation on the ever-changing landscape of international development.
The take-away from this event was that all sectors of development are anticipating and preparing for big changes.
In his plenary speech on the democratization of development, Deputy Administrator of USAID Don Steinberg announced that USAID seeks to obligate 30% of its assistance through local systems—governments, NGOs, and private... Read More »
- May 10, 2012
- What's the Best Way to Retain a Health Worker? Just Ask Her!
This blog entry was originally posted on Disruptive Women in Health Care.
The world currently has a shortage of some 4 million health workers. This shortage is amplified by a complete mismatch between where health workers are stationed and where they are most needed. The healthier and wealthier a community is, the more health workers it has. The poorer and sicker a community, the fewer health workers it has. The situation is worsening as every year hundreds of thousands of health workers move from poor, rural, and underserved communities to wealthier, metropolitan communities with a surfeit of health workers. This occurs both within countries (a nurse moving from a rural area to the capital city) and between countries (a doctor... Read More »
- April 26, 2012
- Skepticism + Playfulness = SwitchPoint?
Last Friday, I sat in the beautiful Haw River Ballroom in the enchanting town of Saxapahaw, North Carolina, with hundreds of eclectic, savvy, and well-traveled individuals at SwitchPoint 2012—IntraHealth’s first annual conference, retreat, and concert on innovation and global health.
I cannot take any credit for SwitchPoint, except for maybe a little glitch in the presentation slides during the afternoon session on challenges and global engagement (sorry folks!). I can say that I am beyond proud to be part of an organization that brings people together to advocate a new way of doing things, even if we don’t quite know what that new way is yet, even if our bread and butter for years might have at times been tied to the standard way of doing things.
Entertainment + Real Needs = SwitchPoint
... Read More »
- April 26, 2012
- iHRIS: Where Are We Now?
This blog entry was originally posted on the CapacityPlus website.
Global health workforce issues have only recently received focused attention in the field of international development. In 2006, the World Health Organization identified 57 countries that had a health workforce crisis, defined as having less than 2.3 doctors, nurses, and midwives per thousand population. That same year, while working on the IntraHealth-led Capacity Project, we visited some of these health workforce crisis countries to see what tools and technologies countries were using to address their health workforce needs.
What did we find? Essentially, nothing. Data on health workers were inaccurate or unavailable, making... Read More »
- April 19, 2012
- Learning from Each Other: Study Tour in Namibia Informs Tanzania's Approach to Health Worker Data
Seeing success is believing in success. That sums up the response of the delegation of staff and partners IntraHealth Tanzania sent earlier this year on a study tour to learn from colleagues in Namibia about their experiences implementing a large-scale human resources information system (HRIS). What an opportune moment it was to borrow experience from Namibia, where IntraHealth is also implementing an HRIS—and one that has made decisive progress!
In both Tanzania and Namibia, long distances between towns pose challenges on financial resources and time. Like many other countries, Tanzania and Namibia historically used manual filing systems to track health worker data and therefore faced difficulties understanding and aligning their health workforces with actual needs. Because data were difficult to access, aggregate, and analyze, plans did not reflect... Read More »
- April 18, 2012
- Pursuing My Passion: A Field Experience in Ethiopia
In a guest blog, former IntraHealth intern Aparna Chandrasekhar describes her field experience working with IntraHealth on strengthening fistula care services in Ethiopia.
For almost a decade, I have been enamored of the advanced fistula care being delivered in Ethiopia. My interest in fistula care first arose after I read a 2003 article in the New York Times by Nicholas Kristof regarding the famed Hamlin hospitals. I was a junior in a five-year Nursing and Wharton joint degree program at the University of Pennsylvania and was beginning to think about avenues in health care to pursue after graduation. This article spurred my burgeoning curiosity about obstetric fistula.
An obstetric fistula occurs when a hole develops either... Read More »
- April 13, 2012
- New WHO Report Urges Countries to Focus R&D on the Health Needs of Developing Countries
This guest post was contributed by Emilia Chiscop, a prize-winning journalist and a 2008/2009 Carter Center Fellow for mental health journalism. She is currently in a graduate program in international development for mid-career professionals at Duke University.
Hot news released last week by the World Health Organization (WHO) could change the future of global health. The new report, Research and Development to Meet Health Needs in Developing Countries: Strengthening Global Financing and Coordination, concludes that “all countries should commit to spend at least 0.01% of GDP on government-funded R&D [research and development] devoted to meeting the health needs of developing countries.” The report has a double significance. First, it is a vigorous statement of the need for a binding agreement on health innovation to address diseases that mostly affect... Read More »
- April 12, 2012
- SwitchPoint: Great Ideas with Real Impact
This blog was crossposted at The RTP Blog
Imagine bringing together thought leaders, inventors, industry greats, tech superstars, multi-disciplinary entrepreneurs, academics, crisis responders, innovators, brand-makers, communication specialists, community builders, and funders from all over the world and asking them to apply their best thinking to the critical challenge of global health. That is what we are doing April 20 at the first annual SwitchPoint Conference.
Why is IntraHealth organizing a global gathering on... Read More »
- April 4, 2012
- Aging Well: Who Will Be There to Walk beside You?
This year’s World Health Day, celebrated on April 7, will focus on aging and health. The older I get, the better I understand that old truism: ‘old age is not for wimps.’ Not that I consider myself old by any means—but I am definitely well into middle age! The motivation and effort required to work out at the gym seems to have increased with my age, while my capacity to party all night definitely hasn’t. But all in all, I consider myself to be aging well, and I realize that I am one of the lucky ones, being physically and mentally active and happy. For all of us, as we age, we are more likely to have restricted mobility or to be living with a chronic condition, such as cancer, heart disease, or dementia. For some of us, the grief of bereavement, consequent loneliness, and perhaps poverty can lead to depression and despair.
The World Health... Read More »
- April 3, 2012
- Picturing Our Work: Who's There?
This blog was originally posted on the CapacityPlus website.
IntraHealth's Dykki Settle was excited to show me his photos from his latest trip to Uganda to support the launch of the country’s HRHIS.
As we breezed through his shots, Dykki picked out a few to linger on and tell me stories about. One stood out in my mind.“I... Read More »
