Institute of Development Studies

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Browsing Institute of Development Studies by Author "Aikins, Moses"

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    Can Action Research Strengthen District Health Management and Improve Health Workforce Performance? A Research Protocol
    (2013) Mshelia, C.; Huss, R.; Mirzoev, T; Elsey, H.; Baine, S. O.; Aikins, Moses; Kamuzora, Peter; Bosch-Capblanch, X.; Raven, J.; Wyss, K.; Green, A.; Martineau, T.
    The single biggest barrier for countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) to scale up the necessary health services for addressing the three health-related Millennium Development Goals and achieving Universal Health Coverage is the lack of an adequate and well-performing health workforce. This deficit needs to be addressed both by training more new health personnel and by improving the performance of the existing and future health workforce. However, efforts have mostly been focused on training new staff and less on improving the performance of the existing health workforce. The purpose of this paper is to disseminate the protocol for the PERFORM project and reflect on the key challenges encountered during the development of this methodology and how they are being overcome.
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    A New Methodology for Assessing Health Policy and Systems Research and Analysis Capacity in African Universities.
    (2014-10) Dalgetty, Gillian; Mirzoev, Tolib; Orgill, Marsha; Erasmus, Ermin; Lehmann, U.; Okeyo, Stephen; J., Goudge; Maluka, Stephen; Uzochukwu, Benjamin; Aikins, Moses; De Savigny, Don; Tomson, Göran; Gilson, Lucy
    The importance of health policy and systems research and analysis (HPSR+A) has been increasingly recognised, but it is still unclear how most effectively to strengthen the capacity of the different organisations involved in this field. Universities are particularly crucial but the expansive literature on capacity development has little to offer the unique needs of HPSR+A activity within universities, and often overlooks the pivotal contribution of capacity assessments to capacity strengthening. METHODS: The Consortium for Health Policy and Systems Analysis in Africa 2011-2015 designed and implemented a new framework for capacity assessment for HPSR+A within universities. The methodology is reported in detail. RESULTS: Our reflections on developing and conducting the assessment generated four lessons for colleagues in the field. Notably, there are currently no published capacity assessment methodologies for HPSR+A that focus solely on universities - we report a first for the field to initiate the dialogue and exchange of experiences with others. Second, in HPSR+A, the unit of assessment can be a challenge, because HPSR+A groups within universities tend to overlap between academic departments and are embedded in different networks. Third, capacity assessment experience can itself be capacity strengthening, even when taking into account that doing such assessments require capacity. CONCLUSIONS: From our experience, we propose that future systematic assessments of HPSR+A capacity need to focus on both capacity assets and needs and assess capacity at individual, organisational, and systems levels, whilst taking into account the networked nature of HPSR+A activity. A genuine partnership process between evaluators and those participating in an assessment can improve the quality of assessment and uptake of results in capacity strengthening.