Democratising data to address health system inequities in Australia.

Understanding the health status of a population or community is crucial to equitable service planning. Among other uses, data on health status can help local and national planners and policy makers understand patterns and trends in current or emerging health and well-being, especially how disparities relating to geography, ethnicity, language and living with disability influence access to services. In this practice paper we draw attention to the nature of Australia's health data challenges and call for greater 'democratisation' of health data to address health system inequities.

Identification of barriers, enablers and interventions to inform deimplementation of low-value care in emergency medicine practice: A protocol for a mixed methods scoping review informed by the Theoretical Domains Framework.

Introduction: Low-value care can lead to patient harm, misdirected clinician time and wastage of finite healthcare resources. Despite worldwide endeavours, deimplementing low-value care has proved challenging. Multifaceted, context and barrier-specific interventions are essential for successful deimplementation.

Digital Chest Radiography Enhances Screening Efficiency for Pulmonary Tuberculosis in Primary Health Clinics in South Africa.

Background: Optimized tuberculosis (TB) screening in high burden settings is essential for case finding. We evaluated digital chest X-ray with computer-aided detection (CAD) software (d-CXR) for identifying undiagnosed TB in three primary health clinics in South Africa.

Methods: The cross-sectional study consented adults who were sequentially screened for TB using the World Health Organization (WHO) 4 symptom questionnaire and d-CXR.

Use and impact of breast cancer survivorship care plans: a systematic review.

Background: Survivorship care plan (SCP) comprising a treatment summary and plan for follow-up care is recommended by various organizations to address long-term needs of an increasing number of breast cancer survivors. Although there have been previous systematic reviews of SCPs in cancer, none has focused on breast cancer exclusively. This systematic review evaluates the use and impact of SCP in breast cancer survivors.

Health service delivery and workforce in northern Australia: a scoping review.

Introduction: Delivering health services and improving health outcomes of the 1.3 million people residing in northern Australia, a region spanning 3 million km2 across the three jurisdictions of Western Australia, Northern Territory and Queensland, presents specific challenges. This review addresses a need for systems level analysis of the issues influencing the coverage, quality and responsiveness of health services across this region by examining the available published literature and identifying key policy-relevant gaps.

Estimating the yield of tuberculosis from key populations to inform targeted interventions in South Africa: a scoping review.

Introduction: Tuberculosis (TB) case finding strategies are recommended to increase yield for TB in key populations. Several key populations are identified in the literature, but techniques for estimating yield and prioritising interventions are needed.

Methods: We conducted a scoping review of existing evidence on TB burden to assess contribution of key populations to the TB epidemic in South Africa.

Projected economic evaluation of the national implementation of a hypothetical HIV vaccination program among adolescents in South Africa, 2012.

Background: Adolescents in South Africa are at high risk of acquiring HIV. The HIV vaccination of adolescents could reduce HIV incidence and mortality. The potential impact and cost-effectiveness of a national school-based HIV vaccination program among adolescents was determined.

The Case for Adolescent HIV Vaccination in South Africa: A Cost-Effectiveness Analysis.

Despite comprising 0.7% of the world population, South Africa is home to 18% of the global human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) prevalence. Unyielding HIV subepidemics among adolescents threaten national attempts to curtail the disease burden.

The Price of Prevention: Cost Effectiveness of Biomedical HIV Prevention Strategies in South Africa.

Background: South Africa has the highest global burden of human immunodefciency virus [HIV]. The study compared the cost-effectiveness of individual and combination HIV preventive strategies against the current rollout of ART and possible ART scale-up.

Methods: Adolescents attending South African schools in 2012 were included in the semi-Markov running annual cycles.