scholarly journals National policy actions on dementia in the Americas and Asia-Pacific: Consensus and challenges

2020 ◽  
Vol 44 ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Fei Sun ◽  
Emmanuel Chima ◽  
Tracy Wharton ◽  
Vijeth Iyengar

Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) affect over 50 million persons globally, and the number is expected to rise. In response, health ministries are developing and implementing policies and programs to systemically address the needs of individuals and families affected by ADRD. While national plans of action on ADRD are advancing among European Member States of World Health Organization (WHO), those in the Asia-Pacific and Americas are lagging behind. Since previous studies have largely ignored the Americas and Asia-Pacific—where approximately two-thirds of the global ADRD population resides—this study sought to identify (a) the socioeconomic factors associated with the likelihood of having a national dementia policy, and (b) to examine common and differing features among the national plans in these regions. Employing the dementia policy guidelines of WHO and the Pan American Health Organization as an extraction guide for data collection and analysis, the national dementia plans and available socioeconomic data of 10 Member States were analyzed with comparative and qualitative analyses. Findings suggested at least a 14-fold increase in the likelihood of having a national dementia plan if a Member State had one of the following: a universal health care system, more than 14% of the population 65 years of age or older, or high-income. All the Member States in the study identified dementia as a public health priority, but priorities differed. Inconsistencies included development of information systems, training for health care professionals, and long-term care systems.

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (15) ◽  
pp. 1098-1101
Author(s):  
Aditi Vinay Chandak ◽  
Surekha Dubey Godbole ◽  
Tanvi Rajesh Balwani ◽  
Tanuj Sunil Patil

Ecosystem, which consists of the physical environment and all the living organisms, on which we all depend, is declining rapidly because of its destruction caused by humans. It’s a two-way relationship between the humans and mother nature. If we destroy the natural environment around us, human life will be seriously affected, and the life of next generation will be endangered unless serious steps are taken. One such effect of human overexploitations has come in the form of coronavirus outbreak. Coronavirus, a contagious disease of 2019 known as Covid-19, is the latest swiftly spreading global infection. The aetiology of Covid-19 is different from SARS-CoV which has the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), but it has the same host receptor, human angiotensin converting enzyme 2 (ACE2). The novel coronavirus which is zoonotic (spreading from an animal to a human) and mainly found in the bats and pangolins is a single stranded ribonucleic acid virus of Coronaviridae family. 1 The typical structure of 2019-nCoV possessed ‘spike protein’ in the membrane envelope, also expressed various polyproteins, nucleoproteins and membrane protein. The S protein binds to the receptor cell of host to facilitate the entry of virus in the host. Currently four genera for coronavirus are found α-CoV, ßCoV, γ-CoV, δ-CoV. SARS-CoV first originated in Wuhan, China and has spread across the globe. World Health Organization (WHO) and public health emergency of international concern declared it as 2019 - 2020 pandemic disease.2 According to WHO report, (7th April 2020) update on this pandemic coronavirus disease, there have been more than 13,65,004 confirmed cases and 76,507 deaths across the world and these figures are rapidly increasing. Therefore, actions for proper recognition, management and its prevention must be prompted for relevant alleviation of its outspread.3 Health care professionals are mainly indulged in the national crises and are working diligently around-the-clock, small ratio of the health care workers have become affected and few died tragically. Dentists are most often the first ones to be affected because they work with patients in close proximity. On 15th March 2020, the New York Times published an article titled “The workers who face the greatest Coronavirus risk” described the dentists are highly exposed, than the paramedical staffs and general physicians, to the risk of novel coronavirus disease 19.4


2019 ◽  
Vol 36 (11) ◽  
pp. 947-954 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danielle Zweers ◽  
Alexander de Graeff ◽  
Jette Duijn ◽  
Everlien de Graaf ◽  
Petronella O. Witteveen ◽  
...  

Introduction: Anxiety is a common symptom in the palliative phase, and symptom management depends on the competencies of individual professionals. This study aims to get insight into the needs of anxious hospice patients with advanced cancer regarding support. Method: Semi-structured interviews were performed in admitted hospice patients with cancer. Patients admitted from May 2017 till May 2018 were eligible whether or not they were anxious. Interviews were analyzed and coded within predefined topics. Results: Fourteen patients were included: 10 females, median age 71, and median World Health Organization performance score 3. Most patients were highly educated. Thirteen patients were interviewed within 6 months before death. Information, open communication, sense of control, safety, adequate symptom management, and respect for patients’ coping strategy were the 6 main expressed needs. Conclusion: Assessing patients’ needs regarding anxiety provided important angles where health-care professionals can make a difference in order to support anxious patients in their final stage of life to realize tailored palliative care. Future research should focus on the development of a systematic approach for health-care professionals to manage anxiety in daily care of terminal patients.


2019 ◽  
Vol 72 (4) ◽  
pp. 685-691
Author(s):  
Borys O. Lohvynenko ◽  
Roman V. Myroniuk ◽  
Olexander P. Svitlychnyy ◽  
Aleksey Y. Prokopenko ◽  
Lidija I. Kalenichenko

Introduction: Nowadays there is the transformation of the national health care system in Ukraine, the ultimate goal of which is to create a modern, competitive model of medical care of citizens on the basis of forming packages of free medical services. However, the model adopted by Ukraine is in contradiction with national legislation in part of free medical aid guaranteed by the Art. 49 of the Constitution of Ukraine, and fragmentary considers positive international practices. The aim of the paper is to determine the mistakes of the reform of the Ukrainian health care system and to reveal the positive international practices of the organization of health care systems that can be implemented in Ukraine. Materials and methods: National and international legislation, official web resources of the executive authorities of Ukraine, statistics of the World Health Organization, materials of journalistic and scientific periodicals are the materials for the research of the health care system in Ukraine in comparison with international practices. Research methods are cross-sectoral, complex statistical, comparative, generalization, analysis and synthesis. In order to obtain the results, the authors have conducted a critical analysis of the current norms of the national Ukrainian legislation in the health care sector. Review: The authors of the article have studied the main disadvantages of the national health care system in accordance with the concept of reforming the medical sector. Positive international practices that can be implemented into Ukrainian system for the real improvement of medical human rights in Ukraine have been revealed. Conclusions: It has been proved that the ongoing reform of the health care system in Ukraine needs to be reviewed and optimized. It has been offered to consolidate a perspective model of the Ukrainian health care system, its principles and guarantees of immunity at the legislative level.


2020 ◽  
pp. 119-132

INTRODUCTION. The guidelines issued by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2009 regarding hand hygiene (HH) in health care provided health care professionals with scientific evidence that argued that HH principles should be respected when dealing with patients. Despite the passage of years and strenuous attempts to introduce these recommendations to the Polish health care facilities for the prevention of healthcare-associated infections (HAI), these principles are still not being implemented in an optimal way for the patient’s safety. OBJECTIVE OF WORK. The aim was to examine the views and attitudes of physicians (L) and nurses (P) towards the WHO rules of hand hygiene. MATERIAL AND METHODS. The study was performed by means of a diagnostic survey using a questionnaire of our own design; random sampling was used. The study involved 231 LP: 173 (74.9%) women, 58 (25.1%) men, including 93 (40.3%) doctors and 138 (59.7%) nurses. The study was conducted in a multiprofile hospital in Małopolska in 2017. The difference between what the respondents think (their views) and what they do in reality (what attitudes they display) was examined in relation to WHO principles, such as wearing natural short nails and jewelry on their hands. RESULTS. Negative practice of observing these HH principles in relation to views was detected (R = -0.014, p<0.05, R2 = 0.016). Respondents supported the view that the ring could affect HAI and rarely used it in practice, the practice was positive (R = 0.298, p <0.001, R2 = 0.085). Women strongly emphasized the view that wearing long nails has an impact on HAI spread, but in practice they often declared keeping long nails, practice was negative (R = -0.241, p <0.01, R2 = 0.054). In response to the question about the impact of nail painting on the spread of HAI, this view was poorly represented, in practice some of them wore painted nails, the practice was negative (R = -0.226, p <0.01, R2 = 0.045). CONCLUSION. Despite high support for the principles of hand hygiene, in practice, these principles were not always respected, the impact on the practice was negative in areas such as: general adherence to the HH principles, wearing long and painted nails. The compatibility of views with practice was detected in relation to wearing a wedding ring.


2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (6) ◽  
pp. 1001-1011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandrine Roussel ◽  
Mariane Frenay

Background. Two decades after “patient education” was defined by the World Health Organization, its integration in health care practices remains a challenge. Perceptions might shed light on these implementation difficulties. This systematic review aims to investigate links between perceptions and patient education practices among health care professionals, paying particular attention to the quality of practices in order to highlight any associated perception. Method. PubMed, PsycINFO, and Scopus were searched using the following search terms: “perceptions,” “patient education,” “health care professionals,” and “professional practices.” PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines were used. Results. Twenty studies were included. Overall findings supported the existence of links between some perceptions and practices. Links were either correlational or “causal” (generally in a single direction: perceptions affecting practices). Four types of perceptions (perceptions of the task including patient education, perceptions about the patient, perceptions of oneself as a health care professional, and perceptions of the context) were identified as being linked with educational practices. Links can although be mediated by other factors. Results concerning links should, however, be considered with caution as practices were mostly assessed by prevalence measurements, were self-reported and concerned exclusively individual education. When analyzing the quality of practices, the two retained studies highlighted their changing nature and the central role of perceptions with respect to the individual patient. Conclusions. This literature review led us to specify the quality criteria for further research: covering the entire spectrum of patient education, operationalizing variables, exploring specific practices, measuring the quality of practices, developing designs that facilitate causation findings, and considering a bidirectional perspective.


2011 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 68-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Trisha Self ◽  
Kathy L. Coufal ◽  
Jennifer Francois

The global call to action has been communicated from the World Health Organization (WHO), addressed to health care providers and higher education programs. The expressed need is to mobilize a workforce that is “collaborative practice-ready” (WHO, 2010, p. 7), prepared to work as members of an interprofessional team. Although the context of the WHO statement explicitly targets health care professionals, it also addresses the need for services to be contextually based and culturally appropriate and to involve the families, communities, and individuals for whom services are directed. This article will explore the key elements and mechanisms of interprofessional collaborative practice in early childhood service delivery for health care and early intervention specialists from a number of professional perspectives.


Author(s):  
Cheng-Yu Huang ◽  
Kwong-Kwok Au ◽  
Sung-Lang Chen ◽  
Shao-Chuan Wang ◽  
Chi-Yu Liao ◽  
...  

The mortality-to-incidence ratio (MIR) is associated with the clinical outcome of cancer treatment. For several cancers, countries with relatively good health care systems have favorable MIRs. However, the association between lung cancer MIR and health care expenditures or rankings has not been evaluated. We used linear regression to analyze the correlation between lung cancer MIRs and the total expenditures on health/gross domestic product (e/GDP) and the World Health Organization (WHO) rankings. We included 57 countries, for which data of adequate quality were available, and we found high rates of incidence and mortality but low MIRs in more developed regions. Among the continents, North America had the highest rates of incidence and mortality, whereas the highest MIRs were in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean. Globally, favorable MIRs correlated with high e/GDP and good WHO ranking (regression coefficient, −0.014 and 0.001; p = 0.004, and p = 0.014, respectively). In conclusion, the MIR for lung cancer in different countries varies with the expenditure on health care and health system rankings.


Work ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 67 (4) ◽  
pp. 779-782
Author(s):  
Namdeo Prabhu ◽  
Rakhi Issrani

BACKGROUND: The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared novel coronavirus (COVID-19) infection a global pandemic due to the fast transmission of this disease worldwide. To prevent and slow the transmission of this contagious illness, the public health officials of many affected countries scrambled to introduce measures aimed at controlling its spread. As a result, unprecedented interventions/measures, including strict contact tracing, quarantine of entire towns/cities, closing of borders and travel restrictions, have been implemented by most of the affected countries including the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this paper is to share health care professionals’ perspectives who are experiencing COVID19 firsthand in a foreign land. In addition, the role of the Saudi governance to combat the current situation is also discussed. DISCUSSION: Personal and previous experiences as related to Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) by the authors has been compared to the current situation and how it affected our thoughts and management. A review of the evidence-based literature was conducted to investigate the demographics of the region; and to understand the awareness of the various tools that are available and how they were utilized in the present situation of pandemic. CONCLUSIONS: Saudi Arabia has been challenged during the pandemic as are other countries.


1987 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 125
Author(s):  
Max H. Schoen ◽  
Harald A. Arnljot ◽  
David E. Barmes ◽  
Lois K. Cohen ◽  
Peter B. V. Hunter ◽  
...  

2014 ◽  
Vol 70 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emem Agbiji ◽  
Christina Landman

This article explores the possibility and limits of collaboration between medical professionals and pastoral caregivers with a view to overcoming fragmentation and waste in the African hospital care sector. It argues that the quality of health and health care in many African countries is poor. Therefore, a purposeful reform of health care delivery systems in Africa is necessary. Building on the World Health Organization’s statement that the medical model that focuses on medicine and surgery and ignores the factors of belief and faith in healing is no longer satisfactory, it further argues that the medical model (including the bio-psychosocial model) is not sufficient for holistic hospital care; it therefore needs to accommodate complementary approaches (such as pastoral care) and include these as collaborative treatments. The connection of collaboration with quality, value, relationships and the ending of life implies that collaboration is an ethical process of reflection – which could have a legal implication.


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