Local health departments (LHDs) can more effectively develop and strengthen community health partnerships when leaders focus on building partnership collaborative capacity (PCC), including a multisector infrastructure for population health improvement. Using the 2008 National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) Profile survey, we constructed an overall measure of LHD PCC co...

BACKGROUND Although there is strong advocacy for uptake of both the arts and creative activities as determinants of individual health conditions, studies evaluating causal influence of attendance at cultural events on population health using individual population data on health are scarce. If available, results are often only of an associative nature. In this light, this study investigated caus...

This article proposes a critical but non-systematic review of recent health care system reforms in developing countries. The literature reports mixed results as to whether reforms improve the financial protection of the poor or not. We discuss the reasons for these differences by comparing three representative countries: Mexico, Vietnam, and China. First, the design of the health care system re...

Knowledge translation at the Manitoba First Nations Centre for Aboriginal Health Research emerged through several population health research initiatives conducted in partnership with Canadian Indigenous peoples. An initial collaboration to carry out a regional health survey laid the foundation to share leadership, power and decision-making, and resulted in a program to build capacity in the Fir...

BACKGROUND A prospective Population Risk Stratification (PRS) tool was first introduced in the public Basque Health Service in 2011, at the level of its several Primary Care (PC) practices. This paper aims at exploring the new tool's implementation process, as experienced by its potential adopters/users, ie. PC clinicians (doctors and nurses). Findings could help guide future PRS implementation...

BACKGROUND Social franchising is the fastest growing market-based approach to organising and improving the quality of care in the private sector of low- and middle-income countries, but there is limited evidence on its impact and cost-effectiveness. The "Sky" social franchise model was introduced in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh in late 2013. METHODS/DESIGN Difference-in-difference method...

A complex topic like workplace mental health requires multidisciplinary, multi-sectoral, mixed methods research and effective knowledge translation of research findings. In this commentary, two of the 13 institutes that comprise the Canadian Institutes of Health Research - the institute of Gender and Health and the Institute of Population and Public Health - discuss strategies for advancing res...

Through its adoption of the biomedical model of disease which promotes medical individualism and its reliance on the individual-based anthropology, mainstream bioethics has predominantly focused on respect for autonomy in the clinical setting and respect for person in the research site, emphasizing self-determination and freedom of choice. However, the emphasis on the individual has often led t...

The 75th anniversary of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) presents an opportunity to celebrate the past accomplishments of state and territorial health agencies (SHAs) and consider their potential future. Several authors have examined the current and future needs of the governmental public health workforce and future trends impacting the governmental public healt...

As health professionals in the United States consider how to focus health care and coverage to ensure better, more equitable patient and population health outcomes, the experience of Cuba's National Health System over the last 5 decades may provide useful insights. Although mutual awareness has been limited by long-term political hostilities between the United States and Cuban governments, the ...