Description
This presentation by Dr Munakampe defines and outlines the key features of Health Policy and Systems Research (HPSR), a multidisciplinary field focused on understanding and improving how societies organise to achieve health goals. It explains that HPSR investigates real-world issues such as how healthcare is financed, delivered, and used; how health policies are developed and implemented; and why health systems succeed or fail in generating health and broader social outcomes. The material emphasises HPSR's integrated approach, combining health policy and health systems perspectives to produce applied research that directly supports health system strengthening and effective policy implementation. This resource is essential for tertiary students in Master of Public Health, Health Systems Management, or Health Policy programmes, providing a foundational understanding of a field that draws on economics, sociology, anthropology, and political science to analyse complex health systems. It equips learners with the conceptual basis to engage in research that is explicitly policy-relevant and focused on improving system performance. Use this overview to grasp the scope and purpose of health policy and systems research.
What's inside
What is Health Policy & Systems Research? Dr Munakampe Key Takeaways… Features that define HPSR are: the types of issues it addresses the fact that it seeks to address real-world situations and issues it is multidisciplinary, drawing on methods and perspectives from a range of disciplines. HPSR investigates issues such as: how health care is financed, organized, delivered and used; how health policies are prioritized, developed and implemented; and how & why health systems do or do not generate health and wider social goals. Key Takeaways… It brings together health policy and health systems work into one integrated field. This combined focus on health policy and health systems issues provides a strong basis for identifying what can be done to: 1. strengthen health systems so they can better achieve their health and broader social goals; & 2. ensure that the related research is applied research that has the potential to support the implementation of health policies and health system development. Key characteristics of HPSR HPSR is defined as a field: … that seeks to understand and improve how societies organize themselves in achieving collective health goals, and how different actors interact in the policy and implementation processes to contribute to policy outcomes. By nature, it is inter-disciplinary, a blend of economics, sociology, anthropology, political science, public health and epidemiology that together draw a comprehensive picture of how health systems respond and adapt to health policies, and how health policies can shape - and be shaped by − health systems and the broader determinants of health. (Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research, 2011) key characteristics of hpsr HPSR is a multidisciplinary research field, distinguished by the issues and questions addressed through the research rather than by a particular disciplinary base or set of methods; HPSR includes research that focuses on health services as well as on the promotion of health in general; HPSR includes concern for global and international issues as well as national and sub-national issues, as global forces and agencies have important influences over health systems in low- and middle-income countries; key characteristics of hpsr HPSR encompasses research on or of policy, which means that it is concerned with how policies are developed and implemented and the influence that policy actors have over policy outcomes – it addresses the politics of health systems and health system strengthening; HPSR promotes work that explicitly seeks to influence policy, that is, research for policy An integrated approach In practice, therefore, the two apparently different areas 1. Health policies can be seen as the purposeful and of work – health policy and health systems – overlap. deliberate actions through which efforts are made to Together they provide the knowledge base relevant to strengthen health systems in order to promote strengthen health systems whilst also showing how population health. knowledge and other forms of power together influence 2. Health policy actions must not only be informed by policy decision-making. In these ways, HPSR work always an understanding of the current dynamics of health seeks to be policy relevant central elements in HPSR Four central elements in HPSR are: health systems health policy health system development or strengthening health policy analysis. The issues related to each of these elements can be understood through a range of definitions, concepts and frameworks, which also help to generate relevant and appropriately framed research questions. Such frameworks allow us to understand the various elements, characteristics and dimensions of a health system; and to identify the different connections and interrelationships within a health system that need to be considered in order to strengthen them. central elements in HPSR New health policies represent efforts to introduce deliberate and purposeful change within health systems. Ideas and concepts related to policy and the analysis of such policy are an important part of HPSR. In seeking to support better policy implementation, it is critical that we understand the factors that influence policy outcomes. Through understanding the nature of policy and the processes of policy change, we gain new insights that help to explain how health system actors, and the relationships of power and trust among them, influence health system performance The boundaries of HPSR The issues HPSR addresses and how it differs from …
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