Understanding the trends, and drivers of emigration, migration intention and non-migration of health workers from low-income and middle-income countries: protocol for a systematic review.

Introduction: The WHO estimates a shortage of 18 million health workers (HWs) by 2030, primarily in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). The perennial out-migration of HWs from LMICs, often to higher-income countries, further exacerbates the shortage. We propose a systematic review to understand the determinants of HWs out-migration, intention to migrate and non-migration from LMICs.

The Effects of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on Children's Health Coverage.

Background: Prior research of the impacts of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) on children's health coverage has been largely descriptive and focused on the Medicaid expansions.

Objective: This study examined the causal impacts of the PPACA Medicaid expansions and of the PPACA as a whole on children's health coverage through 2016.

Research Design: We utilized quasiexperimental difference in differences designs to estimate the Medicaid expansion and overall PPACA effects.

The impact of the affordable care Act (ACA) on favorable risk selection and Beneficiaries' health status in Medicare advantage: a preliminary assessment.

Background: In response to increasing fiscal pressures, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) sought to reduce Medicare Advantage plan expenses by restructuring the bidding and payment processes. The purpose of this study is to assess the effects of the ACA's payment freeze and restructuring of the bidding and payment processes on favorable risk selection in Medicare Advantage plan enrollment (objective 1) and changes in the health status of beneficiaries enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans over time (objective 2).

Methods: We used the Medicare Health Outcome Survey baseline data (2007→2013) for analyses of the first objective (7 cohorts, 1.

Observation Rates At Veterans' Hospitals More Than Doubled During 2005-13, Similar To Medicare Trends.

When neither inpatient admission nor prompt discharge is clearly indicated for a patient in the emergency department, physicians place the patient under observation in a hospital for diagnosis and treatment. The increasing prevalence of observation stays at hospitals reimbursed by Medicare is receiving considerable attention, but the prevalence remains unexplored in Veterans Health Administration (VHA) hospitals, which are subject to different payment policies. Using VHA data for fiscal years 2005-13, we identified trends and variations in observation rates across twenty-one Veteran Integrated Service Networks and 128 VHA hospitals nationwide.

Improvements in newborn care and newborn resuscitation following a quality improvement program at scale: results from a before and after study in Tanzania.

Background: Every year, more than a million of the world's newborns die on their first day of life; as many as two-thirds of these deaths could be saved with essential care at birth and the early newborn period. Simple interventions to improve the quality of essential newborn care in health facilities - for example, improving steps to help newborns breathe at birth - have demonstrated up to 47% reduction in newborn mortality in health facilities in Tanzania. We conducted an evaluation of the effects of a large-scale maternal-newborn quality improvement intervention in Tanzania that assessed the quality of provision of essential newborn care and newborn resuscitation.

Organizational scope of practice: assessing the primary care and public health activities of health centers and health departments in Iowa.

The objective was to understand how Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) and local health departments (LHDs) address their shared mission of improving population health by determining the scope of primary care and public health activities each provides in their community. A brief mail survey was designed and fielded among executive directors at all 14 FQHCs in Iowa, and 13 LHDs in Iowa representing counties with and without an FQHC. This survey contained a mixture of questions adapted from previously validated primary care and public health survey instruments.