background in many parts of the world, ongoing deficiencies in health systems compromise the delivery of health interventions. the world health organization (who) identified four functions that health systems need to perform to achieve their goals: efforts to strengthen health systems focus on the way these functions are carried out. while a number of studies on health systems functions have be...

background health policies are important instruments for improving population health. however, experience suggests that policies designed for the whole population do not always benefit the most vulnerable. participation of vulnerable groups in the policy-making process provides an opportunity for them to influence decisions related to their health, and also to exercise their rights. this paper ...

in 2014, a series of reforms, called as the health sector evolution plan (hsep), was launched in the health system of iran in a stepwise process. hsep was mainly based on the fifth 5-year health development national strategies (2011-2016). it included different interventions to: increase population coverage of basic health insurance, increase quality of care in the ministry of health and medica...

background although there is a general agreement on the benefits of evidence informed health policy development given resource constraints especially in low-income countries (lics), the definition of what evidence is, and what evidence is suitable to guide decision-making is still unclear. our study is contributing to filling this knowledge gap. we aimed to explore health policy actors’ views r...

Healthcare reform has been a constant phenomenon for the last two decades, regardless of being Bismarckian or Beveridgean. The launch of new reforms has increased in pace to a point that was defined, in a recent BMJ article on the UK National Health Service, as ‘constant redisorganisation’. Most of the policy analysis literature on healthcare reforms has been of Anglo-American origin. Consequen...

the global health agenda has been dominating the current global health policy debate. furthermore, it has compelled countries to embrace strategies for tackling health inequalities in a wide range of public health areas. the article by robert and colleagues highlights that although globalization has increased opportunities to share and spread ideas, there is still great asymmetry of power accor...

BACKGROUND The German Health Interview and Examination Survey for Adults (DEGS) is part of the recently established national health monitoring conducted by the Robert Koch Institute. DEGS combines a nationally representative periodic health survey and a longitudinal study based on follow-up of survey participants. Funding is provided by the German Ministry of Health and supplemented for specifi...