Implementing health system change: What are the lessons from the African Health Initiative?

Lucy Gilson

doi:10.1186/1472-6963-13-s2-s14

Abstract

Implementing health system change: What are the lessons from the African Health Initiative?

Highlights

The five African Health Initiative Population Health Implementation and Training (PHIT) Partnerships represent a rich and important set of health system strengthening initiatives
Considering the role of community health workers, emphasizes that the health system stretches beyond the doors of health facilities, and that health system development requires combined community and facility-based actions
As partnerships, the very essence of these projects is a relationship between actors outside the health system and those working within it: health workers, facility teams, supervisors, district management teams and so on

Summary

Introduction

The five African Health Initiative Population Health Implementation and Training (PHIT) Partnerships represent a rich and important set of health system strengthening initiatives. Correspondence: lucy.gilson@uct.ac.za 1Health Policy and Systems Division, School of Public Health and Family Medicine, University of Cape Town, South Africa Full list of author information is available at the end of the article encompassing histories and past experiences (e.g. of resource availability, management or the usual ways of working), wider sets of actors and agents (including politicians and donors), organizational and other health system reform (e.g. decentralization in Mozambique and health insurance in Ghana) and, no doubt, socio-political change (perhaps, including in patient and political expectations of the health system).

Results

Conclusion