Social Accountability and Graduate Medical Education.

Because graduate medical education (GME) is largely publicly funded, it should be judged on how well it addresses the public's health needs. However, the current system distributes GME resources inequitably by specialty and geography, and neglects to focus on training physicians adequately in the care of populations while reducing health disparities. Instead, GME continues to concentrate training in hospital-based academic centers and in subspecialties, which often exacerbates disparities in health outcomes and access to care.

Community health worker case-detection of asthma or reactive airways disease in a resource-poor community in Nicaragua.

Introduction: Asthma is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in children worldwide, but many cases may remain undiagnosed. Community health worker (CHW) programs have improved detection of other diseases such as childhood pneumonia, but none have been validated for detection of asthma in resource-poor settings. We hypothesized that a CHW administered questionnaire would be effective in case-detection of asthma in a poor Nicaraguan community.

Essential Care for Every Baby: improving compliance with newborn care practices in rural Nicaragua.

Background: Neonatal mortality comprises an increasing proportion of childhood deaths in the developing world. Essential newborn care practices as recommended by the WHO may improve neonatal outcomes in resource limited settings. Our objective was to pilot a Helping Babies Breathe and Essential Care for Every Baby (HBB and ECEB) implementation package using HBB-ECEB training combined with supportive supervision in rural Nicaragua.