Exploring indirect impacts of COVID-19 on local health systems from the perspectives of health workers and higher education stakeholders in the Philippines using a phenomenological approach.

Background: Our study aimed to explore the experiences of stakeholders from local government units, health facilities and higher education institutions on the delivery of non-COVID-19 health services after the initial wave of the pandemic. Methods: Twenty-nine public health workers, thirteen university staff, and four hospital administrators in the Philippines participated. Using a descriptive phenomenological approach, we analysed transcripts from six focus group discussions conducted online between March and June 2021. Findings: The COVID-19 pandemic made the routine health programs inaccessible due to hesitancy among patients to visit health facilities, a shift in public health priorities, and lack of students to augment the existing workforce.Public health workers reported stress and mental health exhaustion. Apart from fear of infection during service provision, public health workers and university staff experienced work overload, pressure to learn new technology, and webinar fatigue. Mental health problems have surfaced as health workers and young people have become more affected while support services remain insufficient.Public health workers have reported actions to maintain service delivery in the new normal such as use of telehealth and social media. However, issues on workforce wellbeing and digital equity posed adaptation challenges. Participants suggested partnership with higher education institutions as pivotal to position local health systems towards recovery. Interpretation: The rapid change in the service landscape highlights the importance of sustainable partnerships, effective workforce management, equitable digital innovations, and promoting mental wellbeing to preserve community, school, and occupational health and rebuild resilient local health systems in low-resourced areas. Funding: This research is proudly supported by the Australia-ASEAN Council, Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

Teaching the affective domain in community-based medical education: A scoping review.

Background: The affective domain is one of the essential areas in the assessment of the learning outcomes of medical students, apart from the cognitive and psychomotor domains. Community-based medical education (CBME) is a common instructional program for medical students in learning about these domains. However, preceptors and researchers pay less attention to the affective domain as compared to the other two learning domains.Aim: To describe the state of the literature on teaching the affective domain through CBME and to develop an initial model for instructional purposes.Methods: A scoping review of the literature was conducted. Out of the 971 references initially retrieved, 22 published references were selected. Relevant data from these references were extracted and analyzed through thematic analysis.Results and Conclusion: The various affective outcomes of CBME in the literature are commonly taught through role modelling and mentoring, providing opportunity to apply knowledge, and immersing in local organizations and communities. However, these teaching strategies will be optimized through a structured and rigorous process of reflection. Reflection is central to the learning experience of medical students, especially that affective outcomes are commonly less apparent. The findings of this review resulted to a proposed initial model in teaching the affective domain in CBME.

Understanding the factors that make public participation effective in health policy and planning: a realist synthesis.

Although researchers argue for the importance of involving the public in developing health policy, there has been little focus on central research questions - such as what techniques of public participation work, in what circumstances, and why. This paper presents a realist synthesis which identifies and explains the underlying mechanisms and specific contextual factors that lead to effective public participation in health policy and planning. Peer-reviewed, English language literature was searched, which resulted in 77 articles for review and synthesis. This synthesis uncovered the underlying mechanism of 'political commitment' that generates public participation effectiveness. The other three possible underlying mechanisms, namely: 'partnership synergy', 'inclusiveness' and 'deliberativeness', were found to potentially provide further explanation on public participation effectiveness for health policy and planning. The findings of this review provide evidence that can be useful to health practitioners and decision-makers to actively involve the public when drafting public health policies and programs and, more importantly, guide them in deciding which strategies to best employ for which contexts.

Systematic literature search strategies for the health sciences

Systematic search of literature is an important skill for researchers to help achieve a comprehensive understanding of the topic of interest. Likewise, clinicians need this skill for them to be updated on the recent evidence in providing relevant health care interventions to their patients. However, many health professionals and health science students rely on the use of limited search engines and few databases without systematically performing search and retrieval of relevant studies. This practice commonly yields inadequate references for a research project or clinical decision-making resulting to an incomplete understanding of the topic at hand. This paper aims to provide an introductory guide for researchers as well as clinicians on the step-by-step process of systematic literature search. It also provides information on the available open-access directories and databases as additional or alternative sources of evidence especially in low-resource institutions. However, careful guidelines must be considered in using open-access sources to maintain the quality of research projects and clinical decisions.

An experience of focus groups fieldwork among novice nurses in the Eastern Visayas Region, Philippines

@#<p style="text-align: justify;">Focus group (FG) as a method of research is becoming popular in nursing. However, limited practical examples on the processes and skills required for the implementation in the Philippines to address the implementation in the Philippines to address the complexity of this methods may prevent novice nurses to pursue more FG-based researches. For nurses and other health researches who intend to use the FG, facilitation and note taking in FG discussions as well as transcribing and translating are important skills to master. Ways to enhance he quality of data should also be devised to improve trustworthiness of findings such as pre-testing of tools, conduct of dis briefing sessions and, validation of translations and other data sources. Through appropriate methodological processes and examples, FG research is valuable in exploring and understanding nursing and health-related issues. This article showcases the experience of nine novice Philippine nurse researches in their aim to achieve high quality FG study on access to maternal health services conducted in the Eastern Visayas region of the Philippines.</p>