Educating and empowering children to make healthy choices across Mexico

In Mexico, one in three children and adolescents are overweight or obese. This increases the risk of diabetes and hypertension, as well as learning and development issues. Additionally, many children are at risk of addiction, teenage pregnancy, and mental health issues.

“Health at your school” is a joint strategy between the Secretary of Public Education and the Secretary of Health (MoH) to address these health risks. It encourages children and adolescents to maintain a healthy body, avoid risky behaviors and acquire healthy habits, through five components: educate for health; curricular autonomy; professionals and students of health at your school; training ...

Strengthening universal health coverage through role delineation in the Solomon Islands

To achieve effective coverage of services, Role Delineation Policy (RDP) was developed following extensive consultation. The RDP defines service delivery packages for six levels of health facilities: rural health centres, area and urban health centres, general hospitals and the national referral hospital; successful advocacy led to inclusion of Universal Health Coverage in the National Development Plan, and to Role Delineation being the central unifying feature of the National Health Strategic Plan, 2016-2020, based on initial implementation experiences, the RDP was revised and will be sequentially will be implemented in rural provinces commencing in 2017.

Pioneering integrated organizational models for improving elderly people’s care in Ängelholm, Sweden

A new integrated care organization (Hälsostaden) was established to merge primary and hospital care with elderly and social care. Hälsostaden is jointly managed by its regional and municipal government and employs 600 professionals across health and social sectors; early investments in stakeholder relationships and trust building were essential for securing the future of the initiative and developing a foundation based on teamwork; finding the uniting objective of improving care for elderly people enabled stakeholders to move forward with planning; contextualizing the initiative within emerging political priorities helped generate political support and secure the necessary legal frameworks; identifying individual ...

Piloting integrated health networks to improve type 2 diabetes care in Andorra

Primary care nurse-physician teams were introduced to lead new diabetes health networks, with the aim of connecting providers across sectors and strengthening primary care gatekeeping; collaboration with stakeholders in the early design stages of the initiative encouraged multistakeholder buy-in from the outset; updated evidence-based care pathways published in a guidebook helped streamline and standardize care; extensive patient education and coaching on self-management skills enabled patients to engage in their own care; pragmatic intermediary solutions were found to address pressing challenges; for example, implementing paper medical records carried by the patient to counter poor communication between providers in the absence of ...

Beyond bariatric surgery: A pilot aftercare programme for bariatric patients in Germany

A pilot aftercare programme offering a six-month nutritional counselling and weight monitoring service to qualifying bariatric patients was initiated by KKH, a major health insurer in Germany; thoughtful presentation of evidence and effective communication of observed problems by KKH staff was crucial for gaining the managerial support needed to start the initiative; capitalizing on existing infrastructure minimized the need for additional resource investments; active patient participation has been encouraged, with health education and counselling used to empower pilot participants to adopt healthy behaviours; continuation of the initiative will be determined based on a comprehensive analysis of collected data once the ...