BACKGROUND In 2007 the European Commission issued the White Paper: "Together for Health". Considered the EU Health Strategy for the years 2008-2013, it offers the cornerstones for setting priorities in EU health actions. OBJECTIVES The public health framework offered in this strategy is explicitly built on shared values--including the overarching values of universality, access to good quality...

With over one million service members separating from the military over the next several years, it seems prudent to ask whether U.S. health care professionals and systems of care are prepared to evaluate and treat the obvious and more subtle injuries ascribed to military deployment and combat. The authors suggest that several systemic interventions-adding military health history sections to ele...

The Value-Driven Health Care initiative and the Executive Order (EO) that underpins it invert the cost/quality equation and proceed from the premise that improving quality first--in terms of both care and system management--will reduce costs and elevate value. Equally essential to the success of the initiative is transparency: access to information that will empower consumers to save on quality...

The Affordable Care Act upholds a major goal to improve quality and population health. To date, major advances have pushed forward concepts and measures in health care quality, focusing primarily on clinical settings. However, the development of such quality concepts and measures in the broader arena of public health has lagged behind those in the narrower world of health care. Closing that “qu...

Background Access to quality obstetric care is considered essential to reducing maternal and new-born mortality. We evaluated the effect of the introduction of a multifaceted voluntary health insurance programme on hospital deliveries in rural Nigeria. Methods We used an interrupted time-series design, including a control group. The intervention consisted of providing voluntary health insuran...

background: the aim of the study was to compare the effects of 'face-to-face education' and 'educational movies' on  'knowledge' and 'practice' of women of child-bearing-age, in terms of health-care during pregnancy and during infancy in a suburban region near tehran city, iran.   methods: in this quasi-experimental study, the sample included 873 married women. questionnaires for knowledge and ...

introduction: ambulatory care is an inseparable part of health care system. it is commonly considered as the entrance of the patient to the health care system. high qualify ambulatory care has an important role in reducing mortality and morbidity rates. on the other hand, quality of information has an important role in the quality and safety of ambulatory health care. it is hence necessary to p...

Teams make up the building blocks of health care and every team—from the executive to the coal face—is composed of diVerent professionals, ideally possessing a variety of skills necessary to produce safe and eVective care. We are constantly reminded of the value of diversity within teams, but the reality is that working together from a variety of perspectives is sometimes diYcult to achieve. Th...

The involvement of patients in the decisions about their treatment or care seems an unquestionable advance. There are philosophical and ethical justifications for this. Evidence is also accruing about its benefits—namely, increased satisfaction with care and communication, increased certainty about making the best decision, reduced anxiety levels, and greater adherence to chosen management plan...