a s the U.S. healthcare system anticipates the requirements of legislated healthcare reform, front and center is the challenge of improving the U.S. healthcare value equation—the need to improve the value received for the health dollar spent. As is often the case, the psychology of change is at play here, whereby humans turn to what they know best as a response. As many health system leaders fa...

In this paper we develop an ethical perspective for public and environmental health practice in consideration of the "right to know" by contrasting consequential and deontological perspectives with relational ethics grounded in the concept of fostering autonomy. From the consequential perspective, disclosure of public and environmental health risks to the public depends on the expected or possi...

BACKGROUND In tobacco control and other fields, point-of-sale surveillance of the retail environment is critical for understanding industry marketing of products and informing public health practice. Innovations in mobile technology can improve existing, paper-based surveillance methods, yet few studies describe in detail how to operationalize the use of technology in public health surveillance...

Introduction Public health surveillance practice is evolving rapidly. In the past decade we have witnessed the globalization of health threats, the emergence and re-emergence of infectious diseases, and an explosion of easily accessible new technologies. This fluid environment challenges the public health community, but also provides it with a unique and fertile environment to innovate and impr...

In 2008/2009, the Orientation: Transition to Public Health Nursing Toolkit was developed to enhance the integration of new hires into public health nursing practice in Ontario and to increase retention of these hires. The changing landscape of public health in Canada, such as the introduction of new standards and competencies, presents challenges to leaders orienting staff to public health nurs...

BACKGROUND Immunisation coverage rates vary considerably at the local level across New Zealand and challenges remain with effectively translating best available research evidence into public health practice. This study aimed to translate best practices from high performing general practices into strategies to improve childhood immunisation coverage among low performing practices. METHODS An i...

BACKGROUND Shortage and maldistribution of the health workforce is a major problem in the Thai health system. The expansion of healthcare access to achieve universal health coverage placed additional demand on the health system especially on the health workers in the public sector who are the major providers of health services. At the same time, the reform in hospital payment methods resulted i...