Measuring health science research and development in Africa: mapping the available data

Wenham, Clare; Wouters, Olivier J.; Jones, Catherine M.; Juma, Pamela A.; Mijumbi-Deve, Rhona; Sobngwi-Tambekou, Joëlle; Parkhurst, Justin

doi:10.1186/s12961-021-00778-y

Cited by 20 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 69 publications

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“…Health budget might not always true in its effect of high research publication. For instance, evidence from a review finding indicated that nations with significant donor investment in health research may not necessarily produce a large number of research [ 75 ]. Articles available across WHO regions were comparable to frequency of articles in WHO African region.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Universality of universal health coverage: A scoping review

et al. 2022

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Background The progress of Universal health coverage (UHC) is measured using tracer indicators of key interventions, which have been implemented in healthcare system. UHC is about population, comprehensive health services and financial coverage for equitable quality services and health outcome. There is dearth of evidence about the extent of the universality of UHC in terms of types of health services, its integrated definition (dimensions) and tracer indicators utilized in the measurement of UHC. Therefore, we mapped the existing literature to assess universality of UHC and summarize the challenges towards UHC. Methods The checklist Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-analysis extension for Scoping Reviews was used. A systematic search was carried out in the Web of Science and PubMed databases. Hand searches were also conducted to find articles from Google Scholar, the World Bank Library, the World Health Organization Library, the United Nations Digital Library Collections, and Google. Article search date was between 20 October 2021 and 12 November 2021 and the most recent update was done on 03 March 2022. Articles on UHC coverage, financial risk protection, quality of care, and inequity were included. The Population, Concept, and Context framework was used to determine the eligibility of research questions. A stepwise approach was used to identify and select relevant studies, conduct data charting, collation and summarization, as well as report results. Simple descriptive statistics and narrative synthesis were used to present the findings. Results Forty-seven papers were included in the final review. One-fourth of the articles (25.5%) were from the African region and 29.8% were from lower-middle-income countries. More than half of the articles (54.1%) followed a quantitative research approach. Of included articles, coverage was assessed by 53.2% of articles; financial risk protection by 27.7%, inequity by 25.5% and quality by 6.4% of the articles as the main research objectives or mentioned in result section. Most (42.5%) of articles investigated health promotion and 2.1% palliation and rehabilitation services. Policy and healthcare level and cross-cutting barriers of UHC were identified. Financing, leadership/governance, inequity, weak regulation and supervision mechanism, and poverty were most repeated policy level barriers. Poor quality health services and inadequate health workforce were the common barriers from health sector challenges. Lack of common understanding on UHC was frequently mentioned as a cross-cutting barrier. Conclusions The review showed that majority of the articles were from the African region. Methodologically, quantitative research design was more frequently used to investigate UHC. Palliation and rehabilitation health care services need attention in the monitoring and evaluation of UHC progress. It is also noteworthy to focus on quality and inequity of health services. The study implies that urgent action on the identified policy, health system and cross-cutting barriers is required to achieve UHC.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Universality of universal health coverage: A scoping review

et al. 2022

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“…Furthermore, even when contradictory findings are available, health research budgets and clinical trial infrastructures may determine health research activities in each continent. Evidence from a review finding of health science research in Africa indicated that nations with significant donor investment in health research may not necessarily produce a large number of health researchers (79). Articles were available across WHO regions that were comparable to African studies.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Universality of Universal Health Coverage: a Scoping Review

Endalamaw

Gilks

Ambaw

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Background: Universal health coverage (UHC) is achieved in the primary healthcare pathways. UHC is about population coverage, services coverage and financial protection. Tracer indicators are used to measure the progress towards UHC. There is inadequate evidence that assesses the extent of the universality of UHC. Evidence is, therefore, needed to map the existing literature and summarize the issues covered in the dimensions of UHC. Methods: A systematic search was carried out in the Web of Science and PubMed databases. Hand searches were also conducted to find articles from Google Scholar, the World Bank Library, the World Health Organization Library, the United Nations Digital Library Collections, and Google. Articles on UHC coverage, financial risk protection, quality of care, and inequity were included. A stepwise approach was used to identify and select relevant studies, conduct data charting, collation and summarization, as well as report results. Simple descriptive statistics and narrative synthesis were used to present the findings. Results: Forty-seven papers were included in the final review. One-fourth of the articles (25.5%) were from the African region and 29.8% were from lower-middle-income countries. More than half of the articles (54.1%) used a quantitative research approach. Of included articles, coverage was assessed by 53.2% of articles; financial risk protection by 27.7%, inequity by 25.5% and quality by 6.4% of the articles as their main research objectives or mentioned in the result section. Most (42.5%) of the articles investigated health promotion and 2.1% palliation and rehabilitation services. Policy and health care level and cross-cutting barriers were identified in the progress of UHC. Conclusions: The results of the study showed that majorities of evidence were from the African region. Methodologically, the quantitative approach was a more frequently used research design to investigate UHC. Palliation and rehabilitation health care services need attention in the analysis of the progress towards UHC. The finding of the current evidence is noteworthy to focus on the quality and inequity of health services in future UHC research. Comprehensive evidence is needed to fully understand and progressively realize UHC.

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“…Therefore, we selected four indicators based on the potential that they might be associated with regionalism collaboration: gross domestic expenditure on R&D (GERD) as a percentage of gross domestic product (GERD/GDP); clinical trials per million population (TRIALS); patent applications per million population (PATENTS); and researchers per million population (RESEARCHERS). The data set used was from a previous study on metrics of African health sciences research capacity [44]. The hypothesis was tested using a Pearson's r test to determine correlation coefficients, with a significance level set at p = 0.05.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Knowledge from evaluations and case studies on national health research system strengthening provide insight into issues like infrastructure, training, and political will [34][35][36][37][38][39][40], which, with issues of adequate financing, have persisted across time although systems and contexts vary [41,42]. Yet, investment in health research in Africa remains inadequate to meet these needs, and there are disparities in health research capacity within and between the five regions of the continent [43,44].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mapping regional cooperation of state actors for health research systems in Africa: A social network analysis

Hedquist

Jones²,

Mijumbi-Deve³

et al. 2022

PLOS Glob Public Health

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Regional bodies can potentially play an important role in improving health research in Africa. This study analyses the network of African state-based regional organisations for health research and assesses their potential relationship with national health research performance metrics. After cataloguing organisations and their membership, we conducted a social network analysis to determine key network attributes of national governments’ connections via regional organisations supporting functions of health research systems. This data was used to test the hypothesis that state actors with more connections to other actors via regional organisations would have higher levels of health research performance across indicators. With 21 unique regional organisations, the African continent is densely networked around health research systems issues. In general, the regional network for health research is inclusive. No single actor serves as a nexus. However, when statistics are grouped by African Union regions, influential poles emerge, with the most predominate spheres of influence in Eastern and Western Africa. Further, when connectivity data was analysed against national health research performance, there were no statistically significant relationships between increased connectivity and higher performance of key health research metrics. The inclusive and dense network dynamics of African regional organisations for health research strengthening present key opportunities for knowledge diffusion and cooperation to improve research capacity on the continent. Further reflection is needed on appropriate and meaningful ways to assess the role of regionalism and evaluate the influence of regional organisations in strengthening health research systems in Africa.

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Measuring health science research and development in Africa: mapping the available data

Cited by 20 publications

References 69 publications

Universality of universal health coverage: A scoping review

Universality of universal health coverage: A scoping review

Universality of Universal Health Coverage: a Scoping Review

Mapping regional cooperation of state actors for health research systems in Africa: A social network analysis

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