RESUMEN
Objective@#To construct an evaluation index system of public health emergency preparedness capacity in county-level centers for disease control and prevention (CDC), so as to provide the evidence for improving the public health emergency preparedness capacity in county-level CDC.@*Methods@#An index system framework was created based on review of health emergency policies, laws and regulations released in China from 2003 to 2023. The importance, sensitivity and accessibility of indicators were scored and screened through two rounds of Delphi expert consultations, and the weights of indicators were calculated using precedence charts. The efficiency of Delphi expert consultations was evaluated using the active coefficient, authority coefficient and coordination coefficient. @*Results@#Eighteen experts participated in consultations, including 9 men, 15 with educational levels of master degree and higher, 12 with preventive medicine or public health as the specialty, and 12 with deputy senior professional titles and higher. The active coefficients of two rounds of consultations were 100.00% and 94.44%, and the authority coefficients were 0.83 and 0.84, respectively. The coordination coefficients of secondary and tertiary indicators during the second round consultation were 0.341 and 0.241, which were both higher than those during the first round (both P<0.05). The final evaluation index system included 8 primary indicators, 21 secondary indicators and 58 tertiary indicators. Among primary indicators, health emergency organization and management (0.203 1), health emergency team building (0.203 1) and financial support for health emergency (0.203 1) had the highest weights, and of secondary indicators, completion degree of health emergency administration regulations (initial weight/global weight: 0.750 0/0.152 3), health emergency team building (0.750 0/0.152 3) and financial support for emergency (0.750 0/0.152 3) had the highest weights, while among tertiary indicators, defining the duty of health emergency administration sectors had the highest weight (0.750 0/0.114 2). @*Conclusion@#The created evaluation index system is feasible for evaluation of the public health emergency preparedness capacity in county-level CDC.
RESUMEN
Background: The need for rehabilitation therapy has increased dramatically with the aging of the population, the prevalence of non-communicable diseases, and the increase in the number of disabilities. Rehabilitation therapists are crucial to provide high quality rehabilitation therapy; however, there is a significant shortage of these professionals in China. One of the effective strategies to address this challenge is using the norm of the workforce for rehabilitation therapy, which is an index for assessing the personnel required in a facility. This research aimed to create a rehabilitation therapist-required norm under institutional perspective in Shandong Province, China, based on the Workload Indicators of Staffing Needs (WISN) method, which was created by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1998 to analyse staff utilization at various levels of the health care system. Methods: We conducted descriptive and quantitative research from October to November 2020 in the rehabilitation department of a tertiary hospital in Weifang City, China. Focus groups, online interviews, and document reviews were conducted to gather data and calculations of the WISN method performed. Results: Admission assessment, pre-treatment evaluation, rehabilitation therapy, post-treatment evaluation, and health education for patients were identified as the main priority group activities. Interviews and analysis of documents summarized five factors related to rehabilitation therapists' health service activities. In this study, the annual working time of each therapist was 1,776 h per year. The WISN method calculations showed that the norm of rehabilitation therapists in this tertiary hospital was 23 therapists. As the department had 13 therapists, there was a shortage of 10 therapists based on the WISN calculation, with a ratio of 0.57, which represented the actual compared to the ideal number of therapists. Conclusion: Workload pressure was high for therapists in this tertiary hospital. This model revealed a demand for ten more therapists in the rehabilitation department. The WISN method can help hospital administrators in therapist workforce monitoring, including in regard to therapists. Therefore, the WISN method should be embraced as part of hospital human resource planning and recruitment strategies to meet increasing rehabilitation needs.
