Documentary research on social innovation in health in Latin America

Abstract

Background: Identifying social innovation in health initiatives, promoting quality of life through them, and transforming current health conditions demand the knowledge, comprehension and appropriation of the theoretical and methodological developments of this concept. Academic developments in social innovation have mainly occurred in and been documented for English-speaking countries, although relevant experiences have been implemented in Latin America. In this article, we describe and analyze how social innovation in health is being approached and understood in this region. Main text: To identify the theoretical and methodological developments of social innovation in health between 2013 and 2018, a scoping review with a mixed approach was carried out. Eighty texts in English, Spanish and Portuguese were selected for a process of reflexive analysis of intra and intertextual reading. The approaches identified in the studied initiatives were complementary. The most applied approaches were innovation in health, technological innovation in health and social innovation, each with twelve publications, and social innovation in health and ecohealth with ten and seven publications respectively. The approaches showed a general interest in reaching the goals of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Alma Ata Declaration and the Ottawa Letter. Conclusions: The social innovation in health approach in Latin America adopts educational strategies, identifies risk factors, optimizes resources, promotes interculturality, participation, community empowerment, and enhances intersectorality and interdisciplinarity. As an approach, process, program or solution, social innovation in health is a conceptual category under construction. This research provides a baseline for other systematic reviews on the subject.

The application of social innovation in healthcare: a scoping review

“…The collective creation of social innovation in health (8/27 studies), either in cross-disciplinary actor teams or networks, has received greater attention. Firstly, the social innovation development process is used to overcome the siloed nature of health and to foster greater interdisciplinarity and intersectionality [ 61 , 62 , 66 , 67 , 69 , 81 , 82 , 87 ]. This is particularly well illustrated in relation to Chagas disease in Guatemala, where innovation in interventions involved collaboration from epidemiology, biology, anthropology, sociology, engineering and architecture, and various funding agencies, international non-governmental organisations, government and universities [ 61 ].…”

“…The Time Bank model ascribed dignity and worth to the life of each person, and this highlighted the value of community members as active participants in healthcare: “The first core value of the Time Bank operations is asset, something of value to share with someone else … no one is worthless in the world … everyone is a contributor to society in his or her own way” [ 84 ]. Social innovations show how trusted community members such as teachers can play a vital role in promoting health and access to services; how women can play a role in the delivery of health products while being lifted from poverty through income generating opportunities; and how elderly people can be both consumers and providers of services [ 61 , 62 , 76 , 80 , 82 , 84 , 87 ].…”

Building the social innovation for health ecosystem in Latin America: experiences and learning from SIHI-LAC

“…Social innovation for health has grown in relevance and momentum across Latin America 1–5. Yet, the potential of social innovation for health appears mostly untapped, with one reason for this being the limited investment to build strong ecosystems that can support social innovation initiatives 6–8…”

Social innovation based on collaboration between government and non-governmental organizations in COVID-19 crisis: evidence from Iran

“…A review of previous studies shows that very little attention has been paid to social innovation in academic research [ 19 ], and this shortcoming is more pronounced in the issue of social innovation based on collaboration between NGOs and government in a crisis. The novelty of this study to its previous ones [ 3 , 20 – 32 ] is to design a social innovation plan based on the collaboration of NGOs and the government in crisis with a wide national or global level. In this study, the collaboration between government and NGOs is discussed in Iran, which is a developing country with a large area and a population of more than eighty million people and a great deal of cultural and ethnic diversity and is under sanctions in terms of international relations.…”