Community Participation In Health Research Articles

Primary health care in Southeast Asia: Attitudes about community participation in community health programmes

Although community participation in health has become a major plank in WHO's Primary Health Care platform, comparatively little concrete programme data has been collected which helps to define its potentials and problems. In an effort to expand knowledge in this area, a study of three Church-related community health programmes in Southeast Asia was undertaken. All three programmes have the stated goal of ‘having the community take responsibility for its own health care’ and as a concrete step in this direction, have developed training programmes for community health workers (CHWs). Starting about the same time, 1973–1975, they provide data for comparative examination of the development of community participation. As part of the study, a questionnaire was designed to elicit information from three categories of programme participants (the medical professionals, the community development workers and the CHWs) in community health programmes. It sought to discover their attitudes about the objectives of community health programmes; impact and measurements of success of these programmes; the role of health services; the role of medical professionals and community development workers in community health programmes; the role and training of community health workers; and financing community health programmes. The hypothesis of the investigation was that all three categories of programme participants in one programme share attitudes distinct from participants in the other two programmes. Although, due to technical reasons, it was not possible to test this hypothesis, the survey produced other conclusions. One was that the categories of professional people (the medical and community development workers) in all three programmes share attitudes which are distinct from the CHWs in all three programmes. Secondly, participants in the same programme most often exhibit the same attitudes when a programme has initiated an activity which enables the CHW to gain experience in health work.

Citizen Participation in Health in the Republic of Cuba

Community participation in health was established as a guiding principle in the development of Cuban health services as early as 1961. This paper examines the nature and scope of popular participation in health utilizing Arnstein's “ladder of participation” as a theoretical framework for analysis. Attention is focused in particular on two of Cuba's mass organizations — the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR's) and the Cuban Women's Federation (FMC) — and on the broad-based People's Commissions on Health and Public Health Commissions which they help comprise. Cuba's strong accent on consumer participation at all levels of society, and particularly at the broad institutional level, is seen as providing an important example to health professionals in other nations concerned with facilitating consumer involvement in the quest for healthier societies.

Community participation in health: A brief review and the experience of Kathmandu Medical College with the Duwakot community

One of the principles of Primary Health Care (PHC), Community Participation is a process through which the stakeholders influence and share control over development initiatives and the decisions and resources which affect them. It is a complex issue that has been studied widely and continues to be of great interest among community health workers. This paper presents a brief review of various aspects of community participation. It then illustrates how it is practiced at Duwakot Community Hospital, Kathmandu Medical College, Duwakot, Bhaktapur, Nepal in collaboration with the local community.

An Address ON THE RELATION OF PHYSIOLOGY TO PHYSICS AND CHEMISTRY: Delivered before the Physiological Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Dublin, 1908

<h3>Objective</h3> The purpose of this literature review was to identify educational approaches addressing low health literacy for people with type 2 diabetes. Low health literacy can lead to poor management of diabetes, low engagement with health care providers, increased hospitalization rates, and higher health care costs. These challenges can be even more profound among minority populations and non-English speakers in the United States. <h3>Methods</h3> A literature search and standard data extraction were performed using PubMed, Medline, and EMBASE databases. A total of 1,914 articles were identified, of which 1,858 were excluded based on the inclusion criteria, and 46 were excluded because of a lack of relevance to both diabetes management and health literacy. The remaining 10 articles were reviewed in detail. <h3>Results</h3> Patients, including ethnic minorities and non-English speakers, who are engaged in diabetes education and health literacy improvement initiatives and ongoing follow-up showed significant improvement in A1C, medication adherence, medication knowledge, and treatment satisfaction. Clinicians considering implementing new interventions to address diabetes care for patients with low health literacy can use culturally tailored approaches, consider ways to create materials for different learning styles and in different languages, engage community health workers and pharmacists to help with patient education, use patient-centered medication labels, and engage instructors who share cultural and linguistic similarities with patients to provide educational sessions. <h3>Conclusion</h3> This literature review identified a variety of interventions that had a positive impact on provider-patient communication, medication adherence, and glycemic control by promoting diabetes self-management through educational efforts to address low health literacy.