The journal Global Health Science and Practice has published a theme issue on Advancing Our Understanding of Provider Behavior Change for Improved Health Outcomes
Below are extracts from the lead editorial and a comment from me.
https://www.ghspjournal.org/content/11/Supplement_1/e2300314
Providers often function in settings with unpredictable or scarce resources, including medical supplies, knowledge, and time.
Although structural approaches and investments that have focused mainly on clinic resources and clinical training are critical for supporting providers, they often do not take into account other drivers and influences on provider behavior, such as underlying attitudes, values, biases, and motivations.
A focus on the client that is too myopic risks leaving providers — as professionals and as humans shaped by experiences and norms — out of the conversation.
Program designers should design interventions that acknowledge and address providers' behavioral determinants and ensure that these are robustly evaluated.
COMMENT (NPW): Indeed 'resources, including medical supplies, knowledge, and time' are fundamental to quality health care. The emphasis should arguably be on empowering health workers with the resources they need. These have been variously described, including the HIFA acronym 'SEISMIC': Skills, Equipment, Information, Systems, Medicines, Incentives, Communication facilities. The first priority is to meet the needs of health workers. There are no short-cuts.
HIFA profile: Neil Pakenham-Walsh is coordinator of HIFA (Healthcare Information For All), a global health community that brings all stakeholders together around the shared goal of universal access to reliable healthcare information. HIFA has 20,000 members in 180 countries, interacting in four languages and representing all parts of the global evidence ecosystem. HIFA is administered by Global Healthcare Information Network, a UK-based nonprofit in official relations with the World Health Organization. Email: neil@hifa.org
