WHO video: What is people-centred care?

What is people-centred care and why does it matter? View this new WHO video to learn more.

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pj-AvTOdk2Q 

Globally, 1 in 20 people still lacks access to essential health services that could be delivered at a primary care clinic instead of a hospital. Where services are accessible, they can be fragmented and of poor quality. WHO is supporting countries to progress towards universal health coverage by designing health systems for people instead of diseases and health institutions, so that everyone gets the right care, at the right time, in the right place.

Launch of WHO Bulletin theme issue on "Measuring Quality of Care"

Global and national efforts to meet the health Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) expanded basic healthcare coverage to tackle infectious diseases and child mortality. These efforts achieved some success. However, a focus beyond healthcare coverage is now needed. If the global community is to reach SDG 3, which aims to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages, it must address a critical issue: the quality of health care.

In June 2017 the WHO Bulletin launched a theme issue on quality of care in the era of SDGs. The papers of the theme issue provide a glimpse into ...

Health closer to home: transforming care in the Solomon Islands

(Feature story originally posted by the World Health Organization: http://who.int/features/2017/health-solomon-islands/en/) 

Imagine spending your entire weekly food budget on an hours-long truck ride along a bumpy, dusty dirt road in tropical heat to reach the nearest hospital. Now imagine doing it pregnant. Six times.

That’s the journey Judith Olivia has made to deliver each of her children, from the remote village of Malatoha in the Solomon Islands to the National Referral Hospital in the capital, Honiara.

The closest health clinic to Malatoha is six hours’ walk away, in the town of Belaha, but Ms ...

IFMSA hosts Youth Caucus on NCDs and adopts the Budva Youth Declaration: A Call to Action on Noncommunicable Diseases

Blog originally posted by the International Federation of Medical Students Association on https://ifmsa.org/2017/03/16/ifmsa-hosts-youth-caucus-ncds-adopts-budva-youth-declaration-call-action-noncommunicable-diseases/ 

Noncommunicable Diseases (NCDs) represent one of the greatest health threats of our century. NCDs are responsible for around 70% of the worlds deaths, of which more than 40% are premature. In IFMSA, we find it crucial to take urgent action to prevent and control NCDs, to ensure our health systems can appropriately manage and treat patients and it is imperative that medical students are trained in all aspects of this increasingly critical challenge of our generation.

Last week, IFMSA hosted an ...

Advancing Health through Attention to Gender, Equity and Human Rights

Attention to gender, equity and human rights can advance health. But the question is: how can this be done? How can health programmes consider the concerns and experiences of women, men, girls and boys from diverse groups as an integral dimension of the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and programmes? Health programmes are increasingly recognizing that one-size-fits-all does not deliver benefits equitably to all population groups and that in some cases inequity may even be exacerbated. Programmes have also learned that attention to gender, equity and human rights is crucial for sustaining achievements in health and development.

In ...

The contribution of integrated people-centered health services to ensuring UHC, the right to health, and leaving no one behind in the SDG era

There is a need to ensure that the voices of the most vulnerable populations are included on the path to universal health coverage. This requires an integrated and people-centred approach in how health services are planned, delivered, monitored and evaluated. Strategies that focus on engaging and empowering underserved and marginalized subpopulations are essential to inform policy and decision-makers on how they can improve access to quality health services and financial protection for disadvantaged subpopulations and address broader societal goals such as equity, social justice, solidarity, and social cohesion. These were some of the key messages to come out of a ...

Making People-Centered Health Services a Reality in Zambia

Originally posted by Paula Quigley, Partner and Technical Lead for Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health (RMNCAH), Health Partners International on https://www.mhtf.org/2017/01/03/making-people-centered-health-services-a-reality-in-zambia/.

The challenge

With the new era of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the accompanying Global Strategy for Women’s, Children’s, and Adolescents’ Health (2016-2030), there is an increasing emphasis on health systems that are patient-centered, holistic and integrated rather than vertically-driven and aim to reduce inequity by serving the most vulnerable and hardest-to-reach populations—all very laudable objectives indeed; but do health systems have the capacity to deliver ...

First steering meeting for the IntegratedCare4People web platform

• On 28-30 November in Granada, Spain, IPCHS stakeholders gathered for the first Steering Meeting of the IntegratedCare4People web platform to identify strategies and commit to a workplan. WHO and its collaborating centre the Andalusian School of Public Health (EASP) organized the meeting, which was attended by WHO Regional Offices, technical experts and other stakeholders. Participants discussed strong strategic positioning and clear articulation of the value of the knowledge platform, and how to support broader outreach of its work. A one-year workplan is being finalized with participants demonstrating commitment to its implementation.

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Resilient and responsive systems can provide integrated, people-centred services

Integrated people-centred services are a key feature of resilient and responsive health systems. This theme emerged strongly during debates during the Fourth Global Symposium on Health Systems Research in Vancouver, Canada on 14-18 November. The theme of the symposium was “Resilient and responsive health systems for a changing world” and it was evident that  resilient and responsive health systems are those which provide integrated, people-centred services and have a focus on primary health care as the frontline of routine services and outbreak response. Resilient health systems were recognized as operating from the end-users and patients back, and not from the ...

Integrated People-Centred Health Services: a key feature on Universal Health Coverage Day

Reforming health services to be integrated and people-centred must be a core element of strategic efforts to achieve Universal Health Coverage (UHC). This was a key message to come out of the UHC Day 2016 Geneva public event on 12 December, at the end of day one of the UHC2030 meeting.

The event was organised by the International Health Partnership for UHC 2030, the World Health Organization, the World Bank Group, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation and Save the Children. Over 250 guests attended this event from governments, UN agencies, civil society, academia and the private sector, all contributing ...