Pandemic preparedness with 20/20 vision: Applying an intersectional equity lens to health workforce planning.

Human resource for health (HRH) is considered critical for achieving Universal Health Coverage, and the crisis surrounding HRH is now established as a global emergency. Their vital role has been central in the pandemic response. Yet, the discussions and deliberations on the recent pandemic treaty circumscribe HRH discussions to their capacities and protection, and address discrimination mainly in relation to gender. While this paper endorses the case for prioritisation of HRH in global pandemic preparedness planning, it re-frames the HRH crisis in relation to the institutional and structural factors driving HRH shortage, maldistribution and skills-needs misalignment. We critique the supply-and-demand framing of HRH crisis as one that obliviates the systematic inequalities within health systems that underpin health workforce motivations, distribution, satisfaction and performance. We propose an intersectional equity lens to redefine the HRH challenges, understand their underlying drivers and accordingly integrate in the global pandemic preparedness plans.

Exploring the inequalities experienced by health and care workforce and their bases - A scoping review protocol.

Planning for investment in human resources for health (HRH) is critical to achieve Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and establish a sustainable health system. Informed planning warrants a better understanding of the health labour market (HLM) to tackle a variety of health and care workforce challenges: from addressing critical supply shortage, to ensuring optimal skills mix and distribution, and addressing motivation and performance challenges. Scant evidence around the overall role of socioeconomic and cultural factors like gender, race, marital status, citizenship (migrant) status, workplace hierarchy etc. in determining workforce composition, deployment, distribution, retention, un- and underemployment, sub-optimal work environments and other factors in the 'HRH crisis' warrants further exploration. This scoping review protocol aims to map and present the available evidence on inequalities experienced by health and care workforce, the socio-economic, cultural and other bases of these inequalities, and their outcomes/ consequences. PubMed, Web of Science, CINAHL and SCOPUS will be used to identify relevant literature. All types of published study designs in English language will be included if they discuss any inequality experienced by any category of health and care workers. Elaborate keyword categories for health and care workers and inequalities context have been developed, tested and reduced to the near-final search string. Eligible articles will be charted using the Joanna Briggs Institute checklist. The sample data extraction chart in JBI manual will be used as a basic skeleton with fields added to it to serve the needs of the scoping review. Descriptive analysis will be performed, depicting basic frequencies. While no further analysis has been advised in the JBI and PRISMA protocol, thematic analysis will be undertaken; following the Braun and Clarke's method with some modification and open coding as suggested by Maquire and Delahunt.

Expert consensus on a protocol for conducting bibliometric analysis of scientific articles on global migration health (GMH).

BACKGROUND: Migration and health are key priorities in global health and essential for protecting and promoting the health of migrants. To better understand the existing evidence on migration health, it is critical to map the research publication activity and evidence on the health of migrants and mobile populations. This paper presents a search strategy protocol for a bibliometric analysis of scientific articles on global migration health (GMH), leveraging the expertise of a global network of researchers and academics. The protocol aims to facilitate the mapping of research and evidence on the health of international migrants and their families, including studies on human mobility across international borders. METHODS: A systematic search strategy using Scopus will be developed to map scientific articles on GMH. The search strategy will build upon a previous bibliometric study and will have two main search components: (1) 'international migrant population', covering specific movements across international borders, and (2) 'health'. The final search strategy will be implemented to determine the final set of articles to be screened for the bibliometric analysis. Title and abstract screening will exclude irrelevant articles and classify the relevant articles according to predefined themes and subthemes. A combination of the following approaches will be used in screening: applying full automation (ie, DistillerSR's machine learning tool) and/or semiautomation (ie, EndNote, MS Excel) tools, and manual screening. The relevant articles will be analysed using MS Excel, Biblioshiny and VOSviewer, which creates a visual mapping of the research publication activity around GMH. This protocol is developed in collaboration with academic researchers and policymakers from the Global South, and a network of migration health and research experts, with guidance from a bibliometrics expert. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: The protocol will use publicly available data and will not directly involve human participants; an ethics review will not be required. The findings from the bibliometric analysis (and other research that can potentially arise from the protocol) will be disseminated through academic publications, conferences and collaboration with relevant stakeholders to inform policies and interventions aimed at improving the health of international migrants and their families.

Bridging the gap: Using CHNRI to align migration health research priorities in India with local expertise and global perspectives.

Background: Migration and health are increasingly recognised as a global public health priority, but concerns have been raised on the skewed nature of current research and the potential disconnect between health needs and policy and governance responses. The Migration Health South Asia (MiHSA) network led the first systematic research priority-setting exercise for India, aligned with the global call to develop a clearly defined migration health research agenda that will inform research investments and guide migrant-responsive policies by the year 2030. Methods: We adapted the Child Health and Nutrition Research Initiative (CHNRI) method for this priority setting exercise for migration health. Guided by advisory groups established at international and country levels, we sought research topics from 51 experts from diverse disciplines and sectors across India. We consolidated 223 responses into 59 research topics across five themes and scored them against five predefined criteria: answerability, effectiveness, feasibility, impact, and effect on equity. We then calculated research priority scores (RPS) and average expert agreement (AEA) each research topic and theme. Results: A third of the 59 research topics were on migrants' health and health care access, 12 on social determinants of migrants' health, 10 on policies, law and migration health governance, eight on health systems' responsiveness, and five on migration health discourse. Three of the top five priority topics pertained to migrants' health care access. The policies, law, and governance theme had the highest overall RPS score. Conclusions: There is a noticeable gap between research priorities identified by experts at the country-level and the current research focus and priorities set globally. This disconnect between the global and local perspectives in migration health scholarship hinders the development of context-specific and suitable policy agendas for improving migrants' health. Our co-developed agenda emphasises the need to prioritise research on the capacity of existing systems and policies so as to make them more migration-aware and responsive to migrants' health needs.