Disparities in diabetes care: role of the patient's socio-demographic characteristics.

Background: The commitment to promoting equity in health is derived from the notion that all human beings have the right to the best attainable health. However, disparities in health care are well-documented. The objectives were to explore disparities in diabetes prevalence, care and control among diabetic patients.

[Equity promotion in Maccabi Healthcare Services: from the Equality Report to an organizational action plan].

Maccabi Healthcare Services (MHS), the second largest HMO in Israel, has chosen to implement a multi-annual strategy to promote equality and equity in healthcare. Within the strategy's framework, MHS will maintain an ongoing process of studying the variability of its members characteristics for the purpose of adjusting service provision and improving health outcomes. MHS has recently published its first Equality Report, dedicated to defining the observed associations between its members demographic and socioeconomic characteristics and their health measures.

Organisational efforts to improve quality while reducing healthcare disparities: the case of breast cancer screening among Arab women in Israel.

Objectives: (1) To improve quality and equity by increasing utilisation of mammography screening among Israeli Arab women. (2) To explore effectiveness of designing interventions with a combined top-down and bottom-up approach.

Design: Retrospective study at two periods of time: 2004--intervention's preliminary stages; 2005--intervention's implementation.

[Redesign of community-based health services: the solution for decreasing the quality gap].

The quality gap is defined as the gap between the observed and the expected, evidence-based, quality indicators. Experts agree that significant reduction of the quality gap requires transformation of the current system of health care provision. Maccabi Healthcare Services has formulated a "change package" in order to redesign its community-based healthcare services.