BACKGROUND COMPASS (Comprehensive Assessment, Strategic Success) is the Florida Department of Health's community health assessment and health improvement planning initiative. Since 2002, COMPASS built state and county health department infrastructure to support a comprehensive, systematic, and integrated approach to community health assessment and planning. METHODS To assess the capacity of F...

BACKGROUND Over the past two decades, mental health reform in Australia has received unprecedented government attention. This study explored how five policy levers (organisation, regulation, community education, finance and payment) were used by the Australian Federal Government to implement mental health reforms. METHODS Australian Government publications, including the four mental health pl...

health policy community that informed and engaged consumers have a vital role to play in improving the quality of care that the U.S. health system delivers to patients. The expectation is that when consumers are armed with the right information, they will demand high-quality services from their providers, choose treatment options wisely, and become active participants and self-managers of their...

Health promotion often comprises a tension between 'bottom-up' and 'top-down' programming. The former, more associated with concepts of community empowerment, begins on issues of concern to particular groups or individuals, and regards some improvement in their overall power or capacity as the important health outcome. The latter, more associated with disease prevention efforts, begins by seeki...

This study aims to determine means of strengthening the health system to accelerate achievement of MDGs 4 and 5 in the Volta Region of Ghana, with a particular emphasis in the Ketu South and Keta municipalities. Secondary data have been used in this study. High maternal and infant mortality is a crucial issue in Ghana. Maternal and infant mortality is high in rural area compared to urban area d...

BACKGROUND Although community engagement (CE) is widely used in health promotion, components of CE models associated with improved health are poorly understood. This study aimed to examine the magnitude of the impact of CE on health and health inequalities among disadvantaged populations, which methodological approaches maximise the effectiveness of CE, and components of CE that are acceptable,...

BACKGROUND The need to promote maternal health in Ghana has committed the government to extend maternal healthcare services to the door steps of rural families through the community-based Health Planning and Services. Based on the concerns raised in previous studies that male spouses were indifferent towards maternal healthcare, this study sought the views of men on their involvement in materna...

Since taking office, President Obama has made substantial investments in promoting the diffusion of health information technology (IT). The objective of the national health IT program is, generally, to enable health care providers to better manage patient care through secure use and sharing of health information. Through the use of technologies including electronic health records, providers can...

in nigeria, the government is implementing the free maternal and child health care programme (fmchcp). the policy is premised on the notion that financial barriers are one of the most important constraints to equitable access and use of skilled maternal and child healthcare. in ebonyi state, southeastern nigeria the fmchcp is experiencing implementation challenges including: inadequate human re...

conclusions development of the job and task analysis to ensure providing the right training needs, applying more evidences through different studies for reforms, more decentralized equipped system with decision-making tools have been proposed for development. results the results showed the specific method of student selection and clear objectives and standards of training related to the health ...