Providing care to individuals, responding to disasters
What are the challenges, limitations, constraints, paradoxes and potential breakthroughs of humanitarian medicine, which specialises in treating marginalised and deprived populations affected by crises? Deconstructing a number of “healthcare utopias,” the studies contained in this volume review the history of global health innovations to which MSF has contributed. They also explore the current state of knowledge, practices and concerns relating to certain focus areas, such as nutrition, AIDS, water supply, food aid, reconstructive surgery, epidemic response, surveillance and disaster epidemiology.
Representations of HIV and impact on care seeking among the men of Homa Bay, Kenya
This study, conducted among the men of Homa Bay in Nyanza Province, Kenya, assesses the representations of HIV and impact on care seeking. It reveals that simply setting up a testing or care campaign does not necessarily mean that the entire population will participate; the message has to be tailored to the target population and fine-tuned even within that population.
Literature review on the evaluation of the quality of care from a patient’s perspective
The study The Patient Perspective of Quality of Care: A Review of the Literature, which we present here was carried out by Hannah Barnett a public health student at George Washington University, intern with CRASH from June to August 2018. This work sums up seventy articles from a variety of disciplines including medicine and public health. It is part of a reflection initiated by MSF a few years ago on medical quality and the patient-centered approach.
Review "Medical Humanitarianism: Ethnographies of practice"
Michaël Neuman's review of "Medical Humanitarianism: Ethnographies of practice" edited by Sharon Abramowitz and Catherine Panter-Brick (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015)
Médecins Sans Frontières and medical quality
The question of quality in the work of Médecins Sans Frontières has been asked from the very beginning of MSF's existence. On the one hand, the issue of improving the quality of practice is a part of ordinary professional activity; on the other hand, Médecins Sans Frontières' work involved working in distant lands and very specific environments, which demanded adjustments to medical practice as a result.
Deadly Gaps Persist in New Drug Development for Neglected Diseases
The Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi) and other researchers, including MSF-Crash Dr. Jean Hervé Bradol, report a persistent deficiency in truly new therapeutics for neglected diseases, despite nominal progress and an acceleration in research and development (R&D) efforts.
Disabilities and Medicine. A survey of the Amman surgical reconstruction project 2012
Our survey bears something of a resemblance to a study carried out by Vanja Kovacic in Homa Bay, Kenya, in which she investigated patients’ disease coping mechanisms and their “dependence on medical institutions”.
Doctor WHO?
In this chronicle "Alternatives Internationales", Rony Brauman discusses the return of using community health workers as primary access points for healthcare, in the recommendations of the WHO and practices of some governments.
Refusing to accept the death toll from drug-resistant TB
Epidemiological studies estimate that nearly nine million people were suffering from active tuberculosis (TB) in 2010, causing upwards of one and a half million deaths. More than 90% of these deaths took place in low- or middle-income countries, thus reinforcing an old idea that TB and poverty are strongly linked.
Follow-up to "Wartime rape: men, too"
The Observer published in July 2012 an article on male rape in wartime. The study described cases of rape in Congo and the aid and medical care they received in Uganda. In reaction to this article, 209 comments were posted. The goal of Marc Le Pape's article is to show how these discussions and exchange of views address gender norms and rules.