This practical manual is designed to support implementation of the World Health Organization (WHO) Guidelines on core components of infection prevention and control programmes at the national level, with special focus on countries with limited resources.
The Guidelines describe what is necessary ...(that is, recommendations) to effectively improve infection prevention and control (IPC). This practical manual outlines how to do this (that is, how to implement the Guidelines). It focuses on the development of a sustainable action plan informed by the local context to put into operation the Guideline recommendation
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The American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology are excited to provide a series of cardiovascular prevention guidelines for the assessment of cardiovascular risk, lifestyle modifications that reduce risk, management of elevated blood cholesterol, and management of increased bod...y weight in adults.
To support the implementation of these guidelines, the Pooled Cohort Equations CV Risk Calculator and additional Prevention Guideline Tools are available in the tools below as well as the AHA Guidelines On-the-Go Mobile App, found in the Apple Store and Google Play. Others may be developed and available in the near future.
The purpose of the ASCVD Risk Calculator is to estimate a patient’s 10-year ASCVD risk at an initial visit to establish a reference point. ACC/AHA guidelines recommend the use of the PCE as an important starting point, not as the final arbiter, for decision making in primary prevention of ASCVD.
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IPCAT2 will assist countries to determine the core components already in place, that is, existing strengths, and to identify gaps or weaknesses to guide action planning. IPCAT2 corresponds to the six core component recommendations of the guidelines targeted at the national level.
It is very impor...tant to understand that IPCAT2 is not intended to be used as an audit tool. Its purpose is to help assess, plan, organize and implement a national IPC programme. The tool provides a general overview of the status of IPC activities according to the guideline recommendations, rather than focusing on specific IPC practices/risk factors related to individual patients or specific.
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Long Acting Muscarinic Antagonists (LAMA) such as tiotropium and glycopyrronium are used in the management of COPD1. They have been shown to improve lung function, quality of life and exercise tolerance. They have also been associated with reduced COPD-related exacerbations, associated hospitalisati...ons and duration of hospital stay. Both the South African Thoracic Society (SATS) and Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD), guidelines recommend the use of long acting anticholinergic drugs (or long acting beta agonists) in moderate to very severe disease as defined by lung function (FEV1). The most up to date guideline, utilizing the GRADE methodology (European Respiratory Society guidelines of 2017), confirms their superiority over long acting β agonists (LABA) as monotherapy for COPD in that LAMA's have demonstrated greater efficacy in terms of exacerbation reduction, with similar safety profile.2 These recommnedations are supported by published peer-reviewed
evidence including individual papers and Cochrane reviews.
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For the purpose of this document, Interprofessional is defined as: Multiple health disciplines with diverse knowledge and skills who share an integrated set of goals and who utilize interdependent collaboration that involves communication, sharing of knowledge and coordination of services to provide... services to patients/clients and their care-giving systems. This best practice guideline, Developing and Sustaining Interprofessional Health Care: Optimizing patients/clients, organizational, and system outcomes is intended to foster healthy work environments. The focus in developing this guideline was identifying attributes of interprofessional care that will optimize quality outcomes for patients/clients, providers, teams, the organization and the system. This guideline identifies best practices to enable, enhance and sustain teamwork and interprofessional collaboration, and to enhance positive outcomes for patients/clients, systems and organizations. It is based on the best available evidence; where evidence was limited, the recommendations were based on the consensus of expert opinion.
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This resource aims to provide relevant and practical guidance to DRR practitioners (policy and programme colleagues), on how to ensure inclusion - particularly of vulnerable groups - in Community-Based DRR (CBDRR) initiatives in Myanmar. It comprises an overall Framework for inclusive CBDRR and a nu...mber of tools/resources including: 1) a checklist for inclusion in the 7 steps of the CBDRR process, 2) a guideline for documenting inclusion, 3) a template for assessing inclusion and 4) a compendium of tools and guidelines relevant to inclusive CBDRR.
The Inclusive Framework and Toolkit for Community-Based DRR in Myanmar is a resource produced by the Myanmar Consortium for Community Resilience (MCCR), a consortium led by ActionAid, with ACF, HelpAge, Oxfam, Plan and UN-Habitat.
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The cardiovascular disease continuum begins with risk factors such as diabetes mellitus (DM), progresses to vasculopathy and myocardial dysfunction, and finally ends with cardiovascular death. Diabetes is associated with a 2- to 4-fold increased risk for heart failure (HF). Moreover, HF patients wit...h DM have a worse prognosis than those without DM. Diabetes can cause myocardial ischemia via micro- and macrovasculopathy and can directly exert deleterious effects on the myocardium. Hyperglycemia, hyperinsulinemia, and insulin resistance can cause alterations in vascular homeostasis. Then, reduced nitric oxide and increased reactive oxygen species levels favor inflammation leading to atherothrombotic progression and myocardial dysfunction. The classification, diagnosis, and treatment of HF for a patient with and without DM remain the same. Until now, drugs targeting neurohumoral and metabolic pathways improved mortality and morbidity in HF with reduced ejection fraction (HFrEF). Therefore, all HFrEF patients should receive guideline-directed medical therapy. By contrast, drugs modulating neurohumoral activity did not improve survival in HF with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) patients. Trials investigating whether sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors are effective in HFpEF are on-going. This review will summarize the epidemiology, pathophysiology, and treatment of HF in diabetes.
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This section deals with implementing and improving infection control practices in hospitals, health centres and other health services in the outbreak area. It explains the need for, and implementation of, effective triage procedures, and basic requirements for infection control and supporting activi...ties. Further guidance can be found in the MSF Infection Control Guideline
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Guidance has been updated on a number of chemicals: asbestos, bentazone, chromium, iodine, manganese, microcystins, nickel, silver, tetrachloroethene and trichloroethene. Guidance has also been added for chemicals not previously assessed in the Guidelines: anatoxin-a and analogues, cylindrospermopsi...ns and saxitoxins. The new guidance on organotins has replaced the prior guidance focused on dialkyltins. With these updates, the guideline values for tetrachloroethene and trichloroethene have been revised while new guideline values for cylindrospermopsins, manganese, microcystins, and saxitoxins have been established .
Updated information on cyanobacteria has been included, introducing an alert level framework for early-warning and to guide short-term management responses. Guidance has also been updated in the sections on adequacy of water supply, climate change, emergencies, food production and processing, and radiological aspects, particularly on managing radionuclides when exceeding WHO screening values and guidance levels.
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Accessed on 06.03.2022
Air pollution is contamination of the indoor or outdoor environment by any chemical, physical or biological agent that modifies the natural characteristics of the atmosphere. Household combustion devices, motor vehicles, industrial facilities and forest fires are common sou...rces of air pollution. Pollutants of major public health concern include particulate matter, carbon monoxide, ozone, nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide. Outdoor and indoor air pollution cause respiratory and other diseases and is an important source of morbidity and mortality.
Air pollution kills an estimated seven million people worldwide every year. WHO data shows that almost all of the global population (99%) breathe air that exceeds WHO guideline limits containing high levels of pollutants, with low- and middle-income countries suffering from the highest exposures. WHO is supporting countries to address air pollution.
From smog hanging over cities to smoke inside the home, air pollution poses a major threat to health and climate. The combined effects of ambient (outdoor) and household air pollution cause millions of premature deaths every year, largely as a result of increased mortality from stroke, heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, lung cancer and acute respiratory infections.
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Emergency medicine in Rwanda is underdeveloped. Limited training and infrastructure mean that the country has a high mortality rate from acute conditions such as trauma, malaria and obstetric complications. As Rwanda's disease burden shifts, there is a critical need for standardised emergency care. ...This Emergency Medicine Clinical Guideline (EMCG) provides essential protocols and principles that are tailored to the Rwandan context. The aim is to improve the delivery of emergency care at district and referral hospitals. It is intended as a practical resource for all healthcare providers involved in the management of undifferentiated emergencies.
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Diagnosing asthma in children represents an important clinical challenge. There is no single gold-standard test to confirm the diagnosis. Consequently, over- and under-diagnosis of asthma is frequent in children. A task force supported by the European Respiratory Society has developed these evidence...-based clinical practice guidelines for the diagnosis of asthma in children aged 5–16 years using nine Population, Intervention, Comparator and Outcome (PICO) questions. The task force conducted systematic literature searches for all PICO questions and screened the outputs from these, including relevant full-text articles. All task force members approved the final decision for inclusion of research papers. The task force assessed the quality of the evidence using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach.
The task force then developed a diagnostic algorithm based on the critical appraisal of the PICO questions, preferences expressed by lay members and test availability. Proposed cut-offs were determined based on the best available evidence. The task force formulated recommendations using the GRADE Evidence to Decision framework.
Based on the critical appraisal of the evidence and the Evidence to Decision framework, the task force recommends spirometry, bronchodilator reversibility testing and exhaled nitric oxide fraction as first-line diagnostic tests in children under investigation for asthma. The task force recommends against diagnosing asthma in children based on clinical history alone or following a single abnormal objective test. Finally, this guideline also proposes a set of research priorities to improve asthma diagnosis in children in the future.
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Noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) are chronic medical conditions that are not spread from person to person. Unlike infectious diseases, which are caused by bacteria, viruses, or other pathogens, NCDs are typically long-lasting and result from a combination of genetic, physiological, environmental, and... behavioral factors. NCDs are the leading cause of death worldwide and responsible for over 70% of global deaths each year. Over 80% of these deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries (WHO). Noncommunicable diseases pose a serious threat to global health because they are widespread, costly, largely preventable, and responsible for the majority of deaths worldwide. Reducing their impact requires coordinated efforts in prevention, early detection, and healthcare system strengthening, particularly in lower-income countries. The Toolbox on Noncommunicable Diseases (NCDs) can play a vital role in strengthening Global Healthcare systems by providing centralized, reliable, and up-to-date health information and resources like clinical guidlelines, education material as well as tools for prevention and health promotion.
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Updated 8 June 2021. The document has two sections:
A. The first section covers fundamental principles which are crucial to a successful, holistic intervention.
B. The second covers relevant standards and guidance in the handbook’s Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene Promotion (WASH) and Health... chapters.
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WHO/Europe has launched a new guide, providing support to countries on how to apply behavioural and cultural insights (BCI) for health. It presents a simple step-wise approach, complemented by a rich collection of detailed considerations, tools and exercises. The guide is the first of its kind, spec...ifically developed for use by public health professionals developing policies, services and communications informed by BCI across health topics.
Some of the most persistent public health challenges involve human behaviour. Using a BCI lens means that health policies, services and communications can be tailored to the needs and circumstances of people and communities, and thereby help combat these challenges. The new Tailoring Health Programmes (THP) guide describes how this can be done.
Building on several topic-specific guides that focused on applying BCI to routine and influenza vaccination and tackling antimicrobial resistance, as well as external evaluations and a rigorous peer-review process, this guide is the result of over a decade of work by WHO/Europe. The THP approach has already been adopted in over 20 countries and has received positive feedback from public health agencies.
“This guide is the culmination of a decade of work involving many colleagues at country, regional and global levels. The guide is our “BCI bible”, guiding our work with and in countries to help tackle persistent health challenges,” said Katrine Bach Habersaat, Regional Advisor for BCI at WHO/Europe.
Karina Godoy, Senior Analyst and National Focal Point for Behavioural Insights at the Public Health Agency of Sweden, who is employing the approach described in the guide across several health projects, comments: “The THP guide is easy to use and at the same time provides detailed guidance and inspiration where needed. We have decided to translate the document into Swedish and use the approach widely”.
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Can J Anesth/J Can Anesth June 2018, Volume 65, Issue 6, pp 698–708
Good practices in Mental Health and Well-being
Policy brief.
Globally, one in five people with HIV are unaware of their status, despite considerable scale up of HIV testing, treatment and prevention services. Many of those unreached by HIV testing services (HTS) are from key populations, partners of people with HIV and, in Eastern and southern ...Africa, men and young people. Improving the availability, accessibility, friendliness and quality of services is important to address these testing gaps.
At the same time, tools and interventions that increase the demand for HTS are needed to reach people who are uninformed about HTS options and advances in treatment and prevention, people who are not motivated to seek HTS and those who are hesitant to test because of fear of an HIV diagnosis or other reasons.
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The Disaster Recovery Framework (DRF) Guide for the Health Sector provides guidance on how to implement a comprehensive, integrated, and structured approach to disaster recovery. Its overarching goal is to minimize the impact of the disaster on communities and help countries to recover quickly and e...ffectively from disasters, in coordination with key stakeholders.
The DRF Guide for the Health Sector is adapted from the generic DRF Guide, and draws on the Implementation Guide For Health Systems Recovery in Emergencies, the Health Emergency and Disaster Risk Management Framework as well as the Disaster Recovery Guidance Series. The guide also makes links with multi-sectoral, government-led recovery planning processes such as the Post-Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA), and it supports the implementation of the HDPN.
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