New Zealand’s ‘district health board’ (DHB) system has been under implementation since the 1999 general election. A key factor motivating the change to DHBs is the democratisation of health care governance. A majority of the new DHB members are popularly elected. Previously, hospital board members were government appointees. Inaugural DHB elections were held in October 2001. This article report...

Medical toxicology is somehow a neglected field of medicine. Support for this discipline is necessary as there are many competing interests within a nation's public health priorities (1). In the previous issue of the Asia Pacific Journal of Medical Toxicology, the essentials of the empowerment of medical toxicology in the Asia Pacific region have been discussed (2). Perhaps, there is now an urg...

Internationally, health reform initiatives have identifi ed improved integration between community and acute care delivery as key to sustainability.1,2 Australian reform initiatives have been no exception. In 2009, Australia’s National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission laid the “blueprint” for Australia’s health care future.3 It stressed the importance of “connecting and integrating health...

After a period of financial losses in the University of Pennsylvania Health System stemming from a combination of internal decision making and negative external market forces, the university set out to make substantial changes in the governance and administrative organization overseeing its health system and medical school. The changes were designed to assure the university and its trustees tha...

background quality of health services is one of the most important factors for delivery of these services. regarding the importance and vital role of quality in the health sector, a concept known as “clinical governance” (cg) has been introduced into the health area which aims to enhance quality of health services. thus, this study aimed to assess private and public hospitals’ readiness to impl...

this article provides a commentary to ole norheim’ s editorial entitled “ethical perspective: five unacceptable trade-offs on the path to universal health coverage.” it reinforces its message that an inclusive, participatory process is essential for ethical decision-making and underlines the crucial importance of good governance in setting fair priorities in healthcare. solidarity on both natio...

This paper, part of a series on hospital pharmacy across the globe, discusses current hospital pharmacy practice in Belgium. The paper is organized around the building blocks of the World Health Organization’s Health Systems Framework and covers the following topics: health information; health system leadership, governance, and financing; health workforce; health service delivery; access to med...