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Global AgeWatch Insights. The right to health for older people, the right to be counted

ALBONE, Rachel
et al
2018

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This report considers the progress being made to achieve older people's right to health amid the global drive towards universal health coverage. It explores how older people are currently accessing health services and what changes need to be made to improve on this. It considers the role of data in driving and informing changes to health systems and the services they deliver. Data must be collected with and about older people to ensure adequate evidence for service design and delivery that is targeted and appropriate. This report explores the adequacy of current data systems and collection mechanisms and how, alongside health systems, they must be adapted in an ageing world. 

 

This report is supported by 12 country profiles (for Argentina, Colombia, El Salvador, Kenya, Lebanon, Moldova, Myanmar, Pakistan, Serbia, Tanzania, Vietnam and Zimbabwe; see Appendix 1). These provide national information on trends in the physical and mental health status of older people, and population-level information on access to UHC. The profiles are supplemented by data mapping, showing the national data available on older people’s health in the 12 profile countries, and revealing the data gaps. The data mapping results are available at www.GlobalAgeWatch.org.

Antimalarial drug quality in the most severely malarious parts of Africa - a six country study

BATE, Roger
COTICELLI, Philip
TREN, Richard
ATTARAN, Amir
May 2008

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This article describes research conducted on a range of antimalarial drugs, procured from private pharmacies in urban and peri-urban areas in the major cities of six African countries which were subjected to semi-quantitative thin-layer chromatography (TLC) and dissolution testing to measure active pharmaceutical ingredient content against internationally acceptable standards

Missing the target #5 : improving AIDS drug access and advancing health care for all

INTERNATIONAL TREATMENT PREPAREDNESS COALITION (ITPC)
December 2007

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This report documents how the mobilisation around AIDS is driving health systems advancement in China, Dominican Republic, Zimbabwe, Russia, Kenya, India, Cameroon, Zambia and Cambodia, and it highlights the need for improvements in broader systems of care and services to meet the needs of people living with HIV & AIDS and the communities in which they live. It also considers ARV procurement, registration and stock-outs in Argentina, Belize, Cambodia, China, Dominican Republic, India, Malawi, Morocco, Nigeria, Philippines, Russia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Early infant diagnosis of HIV through dried blood spot testing

PATHFINDER INTERNATIONAL / KENYA
October 2007

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Until recently the test used to diagnose HIV in babies under one-year has required sophisticated and expensive equipment. A new test has now been developed - dried blood spot testing which can be used to diagnose HIV as early as six weeks after a baby is born and has the advantage of being easy to prepare in a resource-limited setting and shipped to testing facilities without refrigeration. If a baby is given prophylactic antibiotics, such as cotrimoxazole, soon after birth and Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) as soon as is medically indicated, it has a good chance of surviving childhood and living a long, healthy life

Pain relieving drugs in 12 African PEPFAR countries : mapping current providers, identifying current challenges, and enabling expansion of pain control provision in the management of HIV/AIDS

HARDING, Richard
et al
January 2007

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This study aims to identify current opioid prescribing services and regulatory bodies within 12 African PEPFAR (Presidents Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief ) countries, and to examine the barriers to, and appraise the potential for, expansion in the number of opioid providers, for people with HIV and AIDS according to the World Health Organization pain ladder. It concludes that while there are common issues raised by services and International Narcotics Control Board competent authorities, it is clear that these key stakeholders have concerns regarding the potential roll-out of opioids

Changing children's lives : experiences from memory work in Africa

HEALTHLINK WORLDWIDE
2007

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This publication aims to share learning from the memory work that Healthlink Worldwide and six other NGOs across sub-Saharan Africa have developed in response to the HIV epidemic. The focus is on learning and analysis in the theory and practice of memory work as well as demonstrating its effectiveness as an HIV response. It is aimed at international and national level policy makers who design and support HIV initiatives, as well as practitioners, who implement responses to the HIV epidemic directly at a local and national level

Medicine prices surveys and proposed interventions to improve sustainable access to affordable medicines in 6 sub-Saharan African countries|Etudes des prix des medicaments et interventions proposeees pur ameliorer durablement l'acces aux medicaments dan

WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION (WHO)
2006

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This document brings together the outcomes of six surveys into medicine prices - for Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Tanzania, Chad and Uganda - and one for the East African Community (Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania) . The reports for Mali and Chad are written in French and the others in English

Delivering antiretroviral therapy in resource-constrained settings : lessons from Ghana, Kenya and Rwanda

RITZENTHALER, Robert
July 2005

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This publication is aimed at governments, development partners, and public and private health facilities seeking to provide ART as part of comprehensive care and support for people living with HIV and AIDS. It describes valuable lessons learned from several ART learning sites throughout Ghana, Kenya and Rwanda. By the end of April 2005, more than 5,800 new patients had initiated ART through this treatment and care initiative. Strategies, challenges and key recommendations are presented and comments by national and community leaders, providers and patients appear throughout the text to give readers a sense of the programs as they progressed. The lessons may not have direct relevance to all health facilities providing or planning to provide ART; it should be used or adapted depending on the epidemiological, political, social, cultural and economic context of each setting

An electronic medical record system for ambulatory care of HIV-infected patients in Kenya

SIIKA, A M
et al
2005

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The faculty at Moi University in Kenya and Indiana University in the USA opened adult and pediatric HIV clinics in a national referral hospital, a district hospital, and six rural health centers in western Kenya using a newly developed electronic medical record system (EMR) to support comprehensive outpatient HIV/AIDS care. The EMR contains more than 30,000 visit records for more than 4,000 patients, almost half taking antiretroviral drugs. This article describes the development and structure of this EMR and plans for future development that include wireless connections, tablet computers, and migration to a Web-based platform

Willingness and ability to use TRIPs flexibilities : Kenya case study

LEWIS-LETTINGTON, Robert
MUNYI, Peter
September 2004

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This paper examines Kenyan legislation and policy in light of the international intellectual property rights framework, in particular the World Trade Oorganization’s Doha Ministerial Declaration decision. It considers the existing sources of supply and associated trends in pricing of pharmaceutical products in Kenya, placing the focus on medicines that are, or are likely to be, affected by these rights

Palliative care in Sub-Saharan Africa : an appraisal

HARDING, Richard
HIGGINSON, Irene
2004

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This report was written from the belief that palliative care is, and will be for the forseeable future, an essential component in the continuum of managing HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa. There is now a wealth of experience in sub-Saharan Africa about the ways in which palliative care can be delivered both affordably and effectively. However, there remains a lack of properly documented evidence and research to demonstrate the importance of this work and promote its development. This report provides a review of existing evaluations of palliative care projects in sub-Saharan Africa with an emphasis on isolating the factors that lead to sustainability, local ownership and scaling up; the role of palliative care in the management of HIV/AIDS and how to integrate palliative care and Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART); primary health based care projects in two countries, Kenya and Malawi, that could provide lessons for the implementation of palliative care; lessons from other parallel programmes which mirror palliative care delivery, for example, tuberculosis programmes, and primary care programmes with good links to local clinics and hospitals, and community mobilization and empowerment projects linked to health facilities. In this way it contributes to the effort of providing an evidence base to demonstrate the importance of palliative care and provides a source of reference for policy makers, practitioners, donors and researchers

Adherence to antiretroviral therapy in adults : a guide for trainers

HORIZONS. Population Council
2004

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Successful HIV therapy requires 95% adherence. As antiretrovirals are becoming more widely available and an increasing number of ARV programmes are launched in developing countries, HIV patients need to be helped to strictly follow a treatment plan. This manual, one of the first adherence training tools developed in Africa, has been designed for health professionals in the province of Mombasa, but can be adapted to other contexts. It consists of four modules, each including Power Point presentations, suggested activities and additional informative material. Module 1 provides basic information on adherence, highlighting the consequences of non-adherence. Module 2 deals with all aspects of patient preparation for adherence and module 3 aims to provide trainees with specific skills in preparatory counseling for patients prior initiating ARV treatment. Finally, module 4 is designed to help health care providers assist patients during treatment

The quality of anti-malarials : a study in selected African countries

MAPONGA, Charles
ONDARI, Clive
May 2003

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This was a pilot study to assess the quality of anti-malarials in selected African countries, and to determine whether the quality of these products was related to the level of the distribution chain at which the samples were collected. The data from this study indicate significant problems of substandard anti-malarial products circulating within the drug distribution chains in the African region. It therefore recommends that quality surveillance systems be set up within drug regulatory authorities in the region and that support be given to manufacturers to improve compliance with good manufacturing practices

Building a dispensary health management information system

SOHANI, Salim
SHARIF, Shanaaz
FOX, John
Eds
2003

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This policy brief focuses on the outcomes of the Kwale Health Systems Strengthening Project (KHSSP), which aims to improve the quality of health care at the dispensary level. The project increased the participation of the local community in the running of the dispensaries and in the development and operation of the health information system that was used. This brief outlines the projects work and lessons that can be learned from it

Changing home treatment of childhood fevers by training shop keepers in rural Kenya

MARSH, V M
et al
May 1999

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Malaria control in Africa relies primarily on early effective treatment for clinical disease, but most early treatments for fever occur through self-medication with shop-bought drugs. Lack of information to community members on over-the-counter drug use has led to widespread ineffective treatment of fevers, increased risks of drug toxicity and accelerating drug resistance. This study examined the feasibility and measured the likely impact of training shop keepers in rural Africa on community drug use. It concludes that this approach is both feasible and likely to have a significant impact

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