The toolkit's purpose is to:
improve the primary health care response for older persons.
sensitize and educate primary health care workers about the specific needs of their older clients.
provide primary care health workers with a set of tools/instruments to assess older people's hea...lth.
raise awareness among primary care health workers of the accumulation of minor/major disabilities experienced by older people.
provide guidance on how to make primary health care management procedures more responsive to the needs of older people's needs.
offer direction on how to do environmental audits to test primary health care centres for their age-friendliness.
The toolkit comprises a number of instruments (evaluation forms, slides, figures, graphs, diagrams, scale tables, country guidelines, exam sheets, screening tools, cards, checklists, etc.) that can be used by primary health care workers to assess and address older persons' health. These resources are meant to supplement and not to replace local and national materials and guidelines
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WBCSD Vision 2050 sets out the goal to achieve the highest attainable standard of health and wellbeing for everyone by 2050, calling for a world in which: people live healthy lives; societies promote and protect health; everyone has access to robust, resilient and sustainable healthcare services; an...d all workplaces promote health and wellbeing. Business has a significant role to play in realizing this vision, thereby creating healthier and happier societies and building business resilience.
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This document puts forward the joint position and vision of an expert, global, multistakeholder working group on implementing Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC) for all preterm or low birth weight (LBW) infants as the foundation for small and/or sick newborn care within maternal, newborn, and child health p...rogrammes, and spur collaborative global action. The document summarizes the background information, evidence, and rationale for making KMC available to every preterm or LBW newborn and seeks to galvanize the international maternal, newborn, and child health community and families to come together to support the implementation of KMC for all preterm or LBW infants to improve their and their mothers and families health and well-being.
This position paper is intended to be used by policy-makers (i.e. those responsible for national policy, guideline development and budget allocation), development partners, programme managers, health workforce leadership, practising clinicians, civil society leadership (e.g. parent and professional organizations) and researchers/research organizations involved in KMC implementation research.
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28 Dec 2020. The main objective of these guidelines is to provide tools for staff working in the field of immunization to support effective communication between health personnel and the general population, with the aim of strengthening, maintaining or recovering trust in vaccines and the immunizati...on programs in the Region of the Americas.
Available in English, Spanish and Portuguese
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Obesity in all age groups, including children and adolescents, is a public health challenge across all settings. Obesity is now classified as a complex multifactorial chronic disease and not just a risk factor for other noncommunicable diseases and comorbidities. Recognizing the significance of prim...ary health care for an effective and efficient response to the obesity epidemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) has developed guidance on how to build capacity in the health system to deliver health services for prevention and management of obesity across the life course. This policy brief discusses the challenges and opportunities for preventing obesity in children and adolescents, and providing health services to treat and manage those already living with obesity. It outlines possible interventions through the primary health care approach.
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For the 24th consecutive year, PAHO has published the report Health Situation in the Americas: Core Indicators featuring the latest information on key indicators for the Region of the Americas. This 2018 edition includes data on the 82 core indicators for the countries, territories, and sub regions ...of the Americas, grouped into the following categories: demographic-socioeconomic, health status, risk factors, service coverage, and health systems. Information is also presented on 22 indicators of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
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Making the Case for Alcohol as a Public Health Threat in the Region. The purpose of this document is to explain the need for making alcohol a top public health priority in the region and the need for national and regional action. Current evidence-based research shows that alcohol consumption and dri...nking patterns in the Americas are at damaging levels, with the region surpassing global averages for many alcohol related problems.
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Left unabated, climate change will have catastrophic effects on the health of present and future generations. Such effects are already seen in Europe, through more frequent and severe extreme weather events, alterations to water and food systems, and changes in the environmental suitability for infe...ctious diseases. As one of the largest current and historical contributors to greenhouse gases and the largest provider of financing for climate change mitigation and adaptation, Europe’s response is crucial, for both human health and the planet. To ensure that health and
wellbeing are protected in this response it is essential to build the capacity to understand, monitor, and quantify health impacts of climate change and the health co-benefits of accelerated action.
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Public Health is the science field dedicated to promoting health and well-being, and preventing disease within the human population to ultimately increase the quality of our livelihood and life span. Public Health does not focus on individual patients or diseases, but rather a given population and ...health system. The discipline is community-centered in its interventions and seeks to improve the health status of whole populations...
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Mortality statistics are fundamental to public health decision making. Mortality varies by time and location, and its measurement is affected by well known biases that have been exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper aims to estimate excess mortality from ...the COVID-19 pandemic in 191 countries and territories, and 252 subnational units for selected countries, from Jan 1, 2020, to Dec 31, 2021.
The Lancet. 10 March 2022. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02796-3.
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This Handbook is primarily for educators, to help them learn about mental health issues and better support them in educational environments. The Handbook aims to provide training to teachers, administrators, and people involved in the education of primary school children about the implementation of ...mental health literacy into daily school life. Such knowledge, skills and attitudes will equip all levels of educators with key tools to support student mental health, manage difficult classroom behavior, and promote students’ wellbeing and academic success.
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The study analyses the current situation of children with disabilities in relation to realizing their rights and accessing basic services, as well as their life experiences in their communities. It also focuses on identifying the barriers created by society that prevent children with disabilities fr...om enjoying their human rights. This includes identifying negative attitudes; environmental and communication barriers; gaps in policies or their effective implementation.
The report reveals that children with disabilities in Myanmar are less likely to access services in health or education; rarely have their voices heard in society; and face daily discrimination as objects of pity. It also highlights how inadequate policies and legislation contribute to the challenges these children face.
The information available in this publication should be useful for policy makers, development partners and Disabled Persons Organisations to promote the realization of the rights of all children with disabilities.
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The GHS Index is intended to be a key resource in the face of increasing risks of high-consequence and globally catastrophic biological events and in light of major gaps in international financing for preparedness. These risks are magnified by a rapidly changing and interconnected world; increasing ...political instability; urbanization; climate change; and rapid technology advances that make it easier, cheaper, and faster to create and engineer pathogens.
Key findings from the study of 195 countries:
• Out of a possible 100 points, the average GHS Index score across 195 countries was 40.2.
• The majority of high- and middle-income countries do not score above 50.
• Action is urgently needed to improve countries’ readiness for high-consequence infectious disease outbreaks.
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Patient-centred care (PCC) is a pillar of quality health services, where decision-making power is shared between the clinician and the patient. Although, this approach could be adopted with easiness in high income settings or in countries with unified health systems, in settings such as Peru, where ...universal access and other structural problems remain a challenge, the practice of PCC is not a priority. In Peru, research on PCC has been conducted for almost two decades, but this has not generated a need for development in academia, decision makers, health personnel or patients. Here, we give an overview of the road that PCC research has taken in Peru and the challenges that remain to translate it into clinical practice.
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The World Health Organization (WHO) and United NationsHuman Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) joint globalreport, Hidden cities: unmasking and overcoming healthinequities in urban settings, exposes the extent to whichcertain city dwellers suffer disproportionately from a wide range of diseases and ...health problems. This report provides information and tools to helpgovernments and local leaders reduce health inequities in their cities. The objective of the report is not tocompare rural and urban health inequities. Urban healthinequities need to be addressed specifically for they aredifferent in their magnitude and in their distribution.
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This report summarizes the latest scientific knowledge on the links between exposure to air pollution and adverse health effects in children. It is intended to inform and motivate individual and collective action by health care professionals to prevent damage to children’s health from exposure to ...air pollution.
Air pollution is a major environmental health threat. Exposure to fine particles in both the ambient environment and in the household causes about seven million premature deaths each year. Ambient air pollution alone imposes enormous costs on the global economy, amounting to more than US$ 5 trillion in total welfare losses in 2013.
This public health crisis is receiving more attention, but one critical aspect is often overlooked: how air pollution affects children in uniquely damaging ways. Recent data released by the World Health Organization (WHO) show that air pollution has a vast and terrible impact on child health and survival. Globally, 93% of all children live in environments with air pollution levels above the WHO guidelines (see the full report, Air pollution and child health: prescribing clean air. More than one in every four deaths of children under 5 years of age is directly or indirectly related to environmental risks. Both ambient air pollution and household air pollution contribute to respiratory tract infections that resulted in 543 000 deaths in children under the age of 5 years in 2016.
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The document is structured into five sections. The first presents the key experiences and challenges that justify a renewal of the EPHFs. The second section updates the groundwork for the exercise of public health and provides a framework to inform the exercise of the new essential functions. The th...ird section proposes a new integrated approach for implementing the EPHFs. The fourth section presents a new list of 11 EPHFs related to each stage of this integrated approach. Finally, in the last section, considerations are put forth to guide EPHF implementation as a means of strengthening the health sector.
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Exposure to air pollution causes 7 million deaths worldwide every year and costs an estimated US$ 5.11 trillion in welfare losses globally. In the 15 countries that emit the most greenhouse gas emissions, the health impacts of air pollution are estimated to cost more than 4% of their GDP. Actions to... meet the Paris goals would cost around 1% of global GDP. The report provides recommendations for governments on how to maximize the health benefits of tackling climate change and avoid the worst health impacts of this global challenge.
It describes how countries around the world are now taking action to protect lives from the impacts of climate change – but that the scale of support remains woefully inadequate, particularly for the small island developing states, and least developed countries. Only approximately 0.5% of multilateral climate funds dispersed for climate change adaptation have been allocated to health projects
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Planetary health is a transdisciplinary approach that aims to advance the understanding of the links between human-driven changes to the planet and their consequences, and to develop appropriate solutions to the challenges identified. This emerging movement has not yet agreed upon a code of ethics t...o underpin the rapidly expanding body of research being carried out in its
name. However, a code of ethics might support the principles for planetary health set out in the Canmore Declaration of 2018. Phrases such as “Public Health 2.0”, “Human Health in an Era of Global Environmental Change”, or “A safe and just operating space for humanity” are often used in planetary health discussions, but are not always clearly defined and so far, the field lacks a strong guiding ethical framework. In this paper, we propose a starting point towards a code of ethics for planetary health that builds on the Canmore Declaration.
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Conflict, in its active or latent forms, is everywhere. The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated that public health emergencies can strike any country at any time. Given the universality of and interconnections between conflict, humanitarian crises, and public health emergencies, practitioners trained... in one sector or the other are being called upon to understand how to navigate all of these emergencies at once.
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