Capacity building in health economics opportunities for training in developing countries

This paper provides an overview of the opportunities available for training in health economics in the regions of Africa, Asia and Latin America, following a WHO forum on Capacity Building in Health Economics held in Geneva in December 1995. It describes in brief the training opportunities available throughout Asia, Africa and Latin America. It then gives a detailed resume of courses available for students and professionals at Chulanlongkorn University, Thailand, the University of Cape Town, South Africa and the University of the West Indies, Trinidad. It also describes the international and regional networks which have developed and now provide further opportunities for training. The final section of this paper looks to the future and suggests that although continued financial and academic support will be needed from the countries of the North, the development of regional capacities in health economics should be as much as possible through regional resources, the regional strategies should be an priority.(AU)

Training of health professionals and community leaders in techniques to promote demand reduction for drugs

The problem of drug and its associated harmful effects on the individuals, their families and the nation has received a great deal of attention during the past decade. Media campaigns, traditional or affective educational programmes and other alternate activities, designed to help individuals achieve total abstinence, or modify their pattern of use were rarely successful at influencing behaviour change. It may be due to unsound methodology used to carry out these intervention programmes. A multidimensional intervention programme involving teaching and training of health professionals together with selected communities, is therefore, suggested. Under this programme, a problem based methodology will be used to resolve the issue of drug abuse through the process of active learning. The major component of this methodology will be to develop techniques for training of health professionals in drug prevention. The trained health professionals in turn will train community leaders who will increase the community's competence to deal with drug abuse. Community leaders together with the support of Neuroscience, Adolescent Development and Drug Research Programme (NADRAP), University of the West Indies, Mona and other such institutes, will be expected to influence the knowledge and behaviour of the individuals in promoting demand reduction for drugs in Jamaica.(AU)

Work, gender, and culture in the Jamaican community health aide programme

This dissertation explores the relationship among the organization of work in primary health care, the workplace culture of the Jamaican community health aides, and their domestic culture. Collected during twelve months of fieldwork in St. James parish in 1987 and 1988, the data include field notes from participant observation with community health aides, transcrips of tape recorded interviews with twenty aides, and information found in manuals and reports of the Ministry of Health and the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine at the University of the West Indies. National and international political and economic forces, the position of women in Jamaica, and contradictions in primary health care policy coverage in the Jamaican health service where they shape the organization of work in primary health care and give rise to the constraints and possibilities the community health aides find in their work. Fraught with conflicts and ambiguities, the organization of work in primary health care provides the space for, and necessitates, the workplace culture that emerges in the ideology and daily practices of the community health aides. With women predominating at every level in primary health care in Jamaica, domestic culture is a resource in the aides' response to the organization of their work and the workplace culture that emerges. Four features define the community health aides' workplace culture: 1) the aides'ability to construct an identity as mediators between the health service and the community from their marginal position in the hierarchial organization of primary health care; 2) the aides' ability to negotiate a compromise between the competing demands for staff in the health centers and community work, a compromise they turn to advantage in maintaining their claim to unique knowledge of their communities; 3) the aides' ability to cope, on the basis of their commitment to primary health care and their empathy with people, with material contradictions in their workplace; the permeability of the aides' workplace to their domestic culture which supports them in their struggle for control over their work and a better daily life while it enhances the delivery of primary health care. (AU)

One year of cooperation in health: UG/UTMB/THF projects

Reports on the collaborative activities for the improvement of community health status between the Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Guyana, the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston and the Health Foundation in New York. Provides individual project reports, projections for future cooperation and reports on funding. (Summary)

Training primary health care workers for the Caribbean

In a programme inaugurated in Jamaica, community health aides have been trained to act as primary health workers. They form an important link between health departments and the communities they serve. The idea, which has spread to other Caribbean countries, is helping to solve the problem of manpower to meet health service needs.(AU)

Implementing an occupational therapy assistant training course for the Eastern Caribbean

The Eastern Caribbean region is working toward providing rehabilitation services for all handicapped persons. With the realization that there will not be enough trained therapists in the West Indies for many years, it is hoped that the training of occupational therapy assistants will help fill the gap in rehabilitation services. Many compromises and adaptations needed to be made to make this program a reality. However, the lively enthusiasm and commitment of the first group of students in the OTA program helped to compensate for the lack of material wealth and resources. (Summary)