scholarly journals Adapt or die?

Curationis ◽  
1996 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
S. S. Visser ◽  
A. H. Nel

The worldwide economic recession and the concomitant limited stock of finances have had an influence on the available money of every household and have also inhibited the improvement of socio-economic conditions and medicine. The Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) has the objective of improving the living conditions of the people with regard to housing, education, training and health care. The latter seems to be a major problem which has to be addressed with the emphasis on the preventive and promotional aspects of health care. A comprehensive health care system did not come into being properly in the past because of the maldistribution of health care services, personnel and differences in culture and health care beliefs and values. The question that now arises, is how to render a quality health care service within the constraints of inadequate financing and resources. A comprehensive literature study has been done with reference to quality health care and financing followed by a survey of existing health services and finances.

Curationis ◽  
1998 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
N. Geyer

The nurse plays an important role in the delivery of primary health care services in South Africa. The primary purpose is to provide the public with access to safe competent basic health care and to achieve this, the nurse should be empowered to practice within legal and ethical boundaries. This paper explores and describes the limitations imposed by legislation on the nurse’s ability to prescribe treatment in the primary health care field. The focus is mainly on the Nursing Act, the Pharmacy Act and the Medicines and Related Substances Control Act which highlights a number of limitations. It is concluded that empowerment of the nurse should not only include addressing the legal boundaries for practice, but also education and training opportunities to equip them with the expert knowledge and skills that they need to render a quality health care service.


Author(s):  
Oluwadamisi Tayo-Ladega ◽  
Taye Mohammed Abdullahi ◽  
K. M. Anwarul Islam

An effective and quality health care service is one of the fundamental visions of every government to its citizenry because it is only the healthy people that can be governed and will value developmental projects. Citizens having access to quality health services translate to significant development in modern society. Therefore, the provision of adequate funds for the sector is essential. However, the Nigeria health care sector is currently confronted with colossal issues that should be surmounted to enhance effective and quality health care delivery to the citizens. This study is rooted in the evidence of appropriate works of literature in the financing of public health care services in Nigeria. From the extant works of the literature surveyed, it was revealed that public health care services in Nigeria are financed by revenue that is accrued from public tax, funding from donors, health insurance, and direct payments made by individuals. Furthermore, public health service is mostly financed by direct payments made by individuals with the government. The most perturbing issues combating public health care financing are direct payments made by individuals, poor government funding, health care policy defects in implementation, and corruption scandals. On this note, the study recommended an effective and robust government funding of public health, implementation of sound health care policies, efficient monitoring of public funds utilization, and discouraging foreign medical trips. JEL Classification Codes: A19, B10, B25, C10, C53.


2011 ◽  
Vol 467-469 ◽  
pp. 1056-1065
Author(s):  
Hui Lung Hsieh ◽  
Chung Hung Tsai ◽  
Bi Kun Chuang

With the growing number of aging population and chronic illnesses, how to help elderly residents access the health care service timely is a challenge for health care institutions in Taiwan. Recent advances in information, communication and biomedical technologies have combined to allow the development of various types of telemedicine technology designed to enhance or expand the health care services of elderly residents. However, most telecare studies focused only on medical care or development of technology rather than on comprehensive evaluation of residents’ (or patients’) perception about service processes. The purpose of this study was to explore rural residents’ perceptions and usage intention of a telecare system after they have used it. Results from this exploratory study showed that most elderly people have never heard or touched telecare systems before the study was conducted. However, the general perceptions of such systems included improvement of interacting with medical staffs, safety protection, convenient care, and one needed item of services in daily life. Especially, the mostly risk perception was privacy risk, that is, data confidentiality and individual privacy. Generally, most elderly residents evaluated their telecare experiences and perceptions as being positive. Besides, most elderly resident were willing to use the telecare system without fees. However, they felt risky about confidentiality and privacy toward this technology. To improve trustworthy perception of this novel technology, telecare providers should implement appropriate safeguards to protect patient health information exchanged in a telecare setting. Also, the physicians/nurses should take the time to communicate with the residents, especially in the form of education, about the benefits of technology. To optimize the effectiveness of this promising technique, more research on the relationship between residents’ (or patients’) perceptions and influences of technology will need to be conducted continually in future.


2007 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Belinda J Gabbe ◽  
Ann M Sutherland ◽  
Owen D Williamson ◽  
Peter A Cameron

To establish the use of health care services 6 months following major trauma, 243 blunt major trauma patients were recruited during their acute hospital stay and followed up by telephone interview at 6 months post-injury. Data collected at 6 months included health care service usage and their level of disability according to the Glasgow Outcome Scale ? Extended (GOSE). Ninety-four percent of patients were living in the community at 6 months, and most (69%) reported continued use of health care services. Of those with ongoing disability, non-compensable patients were significantly more likely (OR 3.7; 95% CI, 1.6?8.6) to have ceased health care service use than compensable patients, independent of injury severity.


Author(s):  
Gökçe Dağtekin ◽  
Zeynep Demirtaş ◽  
Aziz Soysal ◽  
Nilgün Yildirim ◽  
Fatih M. Önsüz ◽  
...  

Background: The study aimed to evaluate the level of knowledge and awareness of glaucoma and their possible determinants in a group of people diagnosed with glaucoma and in a population based group without glaucoma.Methods: The study included people with an age range of 40 to 80years; 410 patients without glaucoma who admitted to primary health care service and 113 patients who admitted to hospitals with diagnosis of glaucoma. In addition to Glaucoma Knowledge Level Questionnaire (GKLQ), participants were asked about their socio-demographic characteristics, level of awareness and resources of the information about glaucoma. Multivariate logistic regression and multiple linear regression analyses were used to assess the variants which have impact on the level of the awareness about glaucoma and to evaluate the factors effective on the score of GKLQ, respectively.Results: The ratio of awareness about glaucoma was found to be 64.1% in people without glaucoma. The knowledge and awareness about glaucoma were found to be higher in glaucoma patients compared to healthy people but not at a desired level. The education level was the only factor effecting both awareness and knowledge about glaucoma.Conclusions: As awareness about glaucoma can lead to early detection, the assessment of the knowledge and awareness about glaucoma is very important in terms of disease prevention. Health education and preventive health care services should be programmed including for both glaucoma patients and healthy people based on the level of their education.


2020 ◽  
Vol 85 ◽  
pp. 02009
Author(s):  
Daiga Behmane ◽  
Anda Batraga ◽  
Mara Greve ◽  
Didzis Rutitis

The study evaluates foreign patients' experience and satisfaction in relation to the health care received in Latvia. By applying the gap model of service evaluation, the study reveals the difference between expected and received service outcome in Latvia, and draws conclusions about the importance of individual and patient experience factors related to the overall patient satisfaction. The study concludes that in all groups of factors matrix proposed in the study: (1) general travel or destination factors; (2) communication factors; (3) factors related to the choice of service and (4) factors related to the choice of health care institution, patients evaluated the perceived health care outcome higher than the expected outcome. The results of the study lead to the conclusion that there is a significant gap in foreign patients' knowledge regarding the possibilities of receiving a high-level health care service in Latvia. The results also reveal the most important determinants of patient experience and related satisfaction.


2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (6) ◽  
pp. 510-521 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiaojiao Ren ◽  
Ding Ding ◽  
Qunhong Wu ◽  
Chaojie Liu ◽  
Yanhua Hao ◽  
...  

The rapidly growing aging population has attracted global attention. This study explores the associations between 3 basic health insurances, and it identifies factors associated with health care services among the elderly populations. This study is based on multistage stratified cluster sampling method from the 2013 China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS) resulting in 7589 participants. Medical Insurance for Urban Employees (MIUE) members were more likely to use inpatient health care services. Health insurance programs were associated with inpatient services usage but not outpatient services usage. There are significant disparities in medical costs and health care service usage among the 3 insurance programs. Health insurance program is only associated with inpatient care. These findings may provide some suggestions to support improvements to the Chinese health care system.


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