Community views on health sector reform and their participation in health priority setting: case of Lushoto and Muheza districts, Tanzania

Public Knowledge, Perceptions and Practices in Relation to Infectious and other Communicable Diseases in Tanzania: Lessons Learnt from Babati District

“…Additional details on the sampling approaches adopted in selecting the study sub-samples are detailed elsewhere. [29][30][31] It was found unnecessary to cover sample size of the households per district for these major reasons: one, the experience obtained from the tools pre-testing and pilot survey phases in preparation for this study whereby it was found that the researcher could stay with a participant by not less than 40 minutes because of some seemingly sensitive or interesting topics talked about; the responses/answers coming out from each of the successive participants were quite similar and recurrent, hence prompting the researchers to find no need for having a large sample size; the study purpose was not to come up with statistical comparisons of the answers/results on the issues under study, but a general understanding on community members' knowledge and perceptions. This was a relevant approach since ethnographic and other social studies may allow a sample of even less than sixty percent of the individuals/cases [33], although the validity and shortcomings of this approach is discussed at the end of this paper.…”

“…This is because the same has been, and continues being, a public outcry even in other districts where the same study was carried out. [30][31] Nevertheless, it is good to be aware that even when the facilities may be in place with committed HWs, some community members may not use them at all or adequately if they have little (or no) knowledge or if they negatively perceive certain diseases or service providers. Theories and empirical evidence verify the significance of people's beliefs, knowledge, and perceptions about diseases in shaping their health behaviours or practices [39].…”

“…[29,30] We appreciate that a larger sample size of the study households and HWs could have provided a large amount of the data to be used for at least a detailed statistical analysis comparing the views expressed by the individual household SSI respondents with different socioeconomic characteristics and experiences. Also, the present study did not go deeper to assess possible scenarios whereby professionals and lay persons might be sharing similar or different concerns/perceptions about certain diseases.…”

“…The major study, part of which was published before examined districts' needs, priority setting, and achievements in relation to TDR diseases and health sector reform in Tanzania. [29,[30][31] http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/rjhs.v2i2.1…”

Implementation and acceptability of strategies instituted for engaging men in family planning services in Kibaha district, Tanzania

“…The district consists of 11 wards which are geographically defined administrative localities formed by at least three villages. Each village constitutes several hamlets (neighbourhoods) if the area is rural or streets if the area is urban [16]. According to the most recent national population census, Kibaha district has a total population of 75,899, out of which15,598 are adult males [17].…”