Cross-Cultural Adaptation of Measures of Childhood Functioning for Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Process Description in a Northern Indian Context

ABSTRACT: Several studies have used various datasets and methodologies to analyze the relationship between bilateral trade and income convergence among trading partners. However, most studies have not paid attention to the effect that income levels and nature of bilateral trade have on the speed of income convergence. In this paper, we argue that the income levels of trading partners and the nature of bilateral trade play important role in the relationship between bilateral trade and international income convergence. To account for the effect of income levels of trading partners, this paper presents an approach that explicitly accounts for bilateral trade among high-income (OECD) countries, bilateral trade between high-income and low-income (SSA) countries, and bilateral trade among low-income (SSA) countries. We also used total trade data for 25 OECD countries and 30 Sub-Saharan African countries over the period 1980-2018 to avoid the potential bias for selecting certain countries based on arbitrary percentage of trade relationship. We used the 2SLS estimations technique to avoid endogeneity problems due to the nature of the dataset. The paper finds that the bilateral trade-income convergence relationship for OECD to SSA is the strongest. This result throws light on the claim that the nature of bilateral trade between high-income and low-income countries promotes one directional knowledge spillover from high-income to low-income countries which enables low-income countries to adopt new technologies and grow faster than their high-income counterparts. Also, bilateral trade among OECD countries, which mostly comprises of differentiated products, promotes descent income convergence among them. However, bilateral trade among SSA countries has the least effect on income convergence. Findings of the study have important implications for bilateral trade among low-income countries and between low income and high income countries. First, if SSA countries want to develop and catch up with their rich counterparts, they should continue to promote free trade with high income countries by dismantling remaining protection policies. Second, the African Continental Free Trade Area's (AfCFTA) efforts to boost the manufacturing sector through industrialization is in the right direction to promote the production of more differentiated products in Africa which will create growth in income for member countries as they trade more. Finally, there is the need for SSA countries to increase investment rates and improve human capital accumulation to enable them to accelerate the adoption of new technologies and grow faster than their high-income counterparts, while bridging the income gap between them through trade.

Many hospitals in HIC rely on just-in-time inventory management, which can be an effective method to cut down on costs, as it calls for minimal reserves of healthcare supplies However, the widespread use of such strategies, which are reliant on consistent and tightly controlled supply chains, have made HIC vulnerable to PPE and supply shortages should demand sharply increase, as has been seen with the COVID-19 pandemic In some HIC hospitals, healthcare workers facing PPE shortages have already had to adopt common practices from LMIC, such as using bin liners instead of gowns and wearing reusable cloth masks HIC providers have also implemented evidence based adaptations, such as creating reusable elastomeric respirators, the development of open source ventilators, and reprocessing N95 masks using the hydrogen peroxide vapor sterilization technique Learning how LMIC providers manage resource limitations through global surgery collaborations can give surgeons working in HIC valuable perspective that has become increasingly relevant during the COVID-19 pandemic The rapid expansion of social media has facilitated such collaborations, and is a valuable tool for networking, mentorship, and information sharing Additionally, the rapid sharing of research findings via social media is enhancing our ability as a global health community to respond to this pandemic in a strong evidence based manner However, it is essential that social media be used responsibly, and that precautions are taken to prevent the spread of misinformation The most vulnerable populations, often linked to the underlying social determinants of health such as poverty, food security, literacy, sex, and racial and ethnic factors, are most at risk of adverse outcomes during these health and social shocks There is already data demonstrating that racial and ethnic minorities in the US and UK are at increased risk of death from COVID-19 Difficulty in accessing care for emergent conditions exists at baseline for these populations, and extensive backlogs for essential operations are commonplace, especially in LMIC This is likely only to get worse during the current crisis and underscores the importance of our professional commitment to health equity - regardless of geography New estimates of the "collateral damage" caused by the pandemic are very concerning and also illustrate the urgent need to mitigate this impact through local and global coordinated action

Navigating the violent process of decolonisation in global health research: a guideline

Objectives: To analyze the effect or impact of Digital Services Trade on economic growth (GDP) of a panel of Low, Middle and High Income Countries.
 Study Design: Panel Quantitative Study.
 Methodology: Dynamic Difference GMM (Diff-GMM) and System GMM (Sys-GMM), Panel pooled OLS (POLS) and Fixed Effects (FE) models were employed in the analyses.
 Results: The System GMM estimator seems to predict that, ceteris paribus, a 1 unit increase in digital services exports significantly impacts GDP growth in Low and High Income countries panels in the short run by 5.7% and 52.4% respectively. The panel POLS models estimate that digital services exports cause a significant long run increase in GDP in High income countries by 39.67% relative to 6.68% in the panel of Middle Income countries and negative growth in Low income countries of 7.74%. The FE models predict that for every 1 unit increase in the number of people using the internet, GDP significantly increases by 42.7%, 27.8% and 0.03% in the Middle, High, and Low Income countries panels respectively.
 Conclusion: The findings of this study indicate that generally, digital services trade seems to have a significant positive effect on GDP of all country panels. However, Low and Middle Income countries are lagging behind. Therefore, this study recommends that, to promote digital trade driven economic growth, the panel of Low and Middle Income countries’ policy makers should increase investments in both institutional and physical digital infrastructure that enable more people, Small and Medium enterprises(SMEs) and rural populations have access to stable, high speed and affordable digital services.

A new path to mentorship for emerging global health leaders in low-income and middle-income countries

The way that health is measured and valued is fundamental to economic evaluation. To date, adult health state values have been routinely used in the calculation of QALYs for the economic evaluation of healthcare treatment and preventive programmes, including those targeted at adolescents. The main objective of this study was to apply profile case best-worst scaling (BWS) discrete-choice experiment (DCE) methods to obtain adolescent-specific values for the Child Health Utility 9D (CHU9D), a new generic preference-based measure of health-related quality of life developed specifically for application in cost-effectiveness analyses of treatments and interventions targeted at young people. A secondary aim was to assess the feasibility of a web-based method of data collection for the valuation of health states defined by the CHU9D. A web-based survey was developed including the CHU9D instrument and a series of BWS DCE questions. Specifically, respondents were asked to indicate the best and worst attribute levels from a series of ten health states defined by the CHU9D, presented one at a time. The survey was administered to a community-based sample of consenting adolescents (n = 590) aged 11-17 years. A conditional logistic regression model was applied to estimate values (part-worth utilities) for each level of the nine attributes relating to the CHU9D. A marginal utility matrix was then estimated to generate an adolescent-specific scoring algorithm on the full health = 1 and dead = 0 scale required for the calculation of QALYs. The results indicate that participants were able to readily choose 'best' and 'worst' attribute levels for the CHU9D health states. Large differences in value were found between the first and fifth levels (indicating 'no problems' and 'severe problems', respectively) for all nine attributes relating to the CHU9D. In general, there was little differentiation between the middle levels of all attributes indicating only limited additional value for adolescents of moving between these levels. Comparison of the adolescent-specific algorithm and the existing adult scoring algorithm for the CHU9D revealed some significant differences in values for identical health states, which may have important implications for the application of the CHU9D to value adolescent treatment and service programmes particularly for mental health. In general, adolescents appeared to place more weight upon the CHU9D attributes relating to mental health (worried, sad and annoyed) than would be implied by application of the existing algorithm based upon adult values. This study provides preliminary indications that there may be potentially important and systematic differences in the valuations attached to identical health states by adolescents in comparison with adult population groups. The study findings lend support to the potential future application of profile case BWS DCE methods to undertake large-scale health state valuation studies directly with young adolescent population samples and provide support for the feasibility and acceptability of a web-based mode of administration for this purpose.

Says who? Northern ventriloquism, or epistemic disobedience in global health scholarship

Availability and affordability of blood pressure-lowering medicines and the effect on blood pressure control in high-income, middle-income, and low-income countries: an analysis of the PURE study data

Telecommunications industry efficiency: A comparative analysis of high and middle income countries

Socioeconomic status and risk of cardiovascular disease in 20 low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries: the Prospective Urban Rural Epidemiologic (PURE) study

Equity in Global Health Research.

European Society of Cardiology: Cardiovascular Disease Statistics 2017.

How much is dementia care worth?

Availability and affordability of cardiovascular disease medicines and their effect on use in high-income, middle-income, and low-income countries: an analysis of the PURE study data

Implementation science and breast cancer control: A Breast Health Global Initiative (BHGI) perspective from the 2010 Global Summit