Cohort study is an irreplaceable method for studies related to maternal and child health. Compared with other countries, China's maternal and child cohort studies started relatively later but has its unique developing track. This paper summarizes the basic information and characteristics of the maternal and child cohorts with wide and great influence in China in the past 25 years.
Child ; Child Health ; Child Health Services/organization & administration* ; China ; Cohort Studies ; Humans ; Maternal Health ; Maternal Health Services/organization & administration*

INTRODUCTIONA significant percentage of paediatric emergency department (ED) attendances worldwide are nonurgent, adversely affecting patient outcomes and healthcare systems. This study aimed to understand the reasons behind nonurgent ED visits, in order to develop targeted and effective preventive interventions.

METHODSIn-depth interviews were conducted with 49 caregivers to identify the decision-making factors related to taking children to the ED of KK Women's and Children's Hospital, Singapore. Interviews were carried out in the emergency room of the hospital after the children had been diagnosed with nonurgent conditions by the attending physician. Interview transcripts were analysed based on grounded theory principles.

RESULTSThe demographics of our study cohort were representative of the target population. The main reasons given by the caregivers for attending paediatric EDs included perceived severity of the child's symptoms, availability of after-hours care, perceived advantage of a paediatric specialist hospital and mistrust of primary care physicians' ability to manage paediatric conditions. Insurance or welfare was a contributing factor for only a small portion of caregivers.

CONCLUSIONThe reasons provided by Singaporean caregivers for attending paediatric EDs were similar to those reported in studies conducted in Western countries. However, the former group had a unique understanding of the local healthcare system. The study's findings may be used to develop interventions to change the knowledge, attitudes and behaviours of caregivers in Singapore.

Adolescent ; Caregivers ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Cohort Studies ; Craniocerebral Trauma ; therapy ; Decision Making ; Emergencies ; Emergency Medical Services ; Emergency Service, Hospital ; organization & administration ; Epistaxis ; therapy ; Fathers ; Female ; Hospitals, Pediatric ; Humans ; Infant ; Infant, Newborn ; Male ; Mothers ; Patient Acceptance of Health Care ; Pediatrics ; organization & administration ; Respiratory Tract Infections ; therapy ; Singapore

The health of adolescents in Papua New Guinea requires urgent attention. At stake is the health and wellbeing of a sizeable proportion of a generation. Adolescence is defined by the World Health Organization as occurring between the ages of 10 and 19 years. For many this can be a time of working through issues and progressing their education to become happy, well-rounded adults. But young people without adequate guidance and education are vulnerable to negative influences and risk-taking, and these can have adverse consequences for health and wellbeing in the short and long term. Many adolescents with chronic mental or physical health currently do not get the services they need. This paper briefly outlines disease burdens for adolescents, and the challenges for health and education services.
Health services administration, Child health services

PURPOSE: Disability is a significant problem and is accepted globally as a health priority in childhood. Like nonvisually impaired children, visually impaired children also need to use health services during childhood. The purpose of this study was to determine the health problems of visually impaired children. METHODS: A descriptive design was used. The subjects were 74 children with visual impairment attending primary school (aged 5e14 years), who agreed to participate and whose parents gave permission. Data were collected via physical examination including questionnaires and a physical assessment form. The health screening included physical measurements for height, weight, blood pressure, dental health, hearing, and scoliosis. RESULTS: The mean age of children was 10.43 +/- 2.9 years. When the health screening results of children were examined, it was found that 25.7% of the children were overweight or obese, 35.1% of them had dental problems, 27.0% had hearing problems, and 39.2% had scoliosis risk. Systolic and diastolic blood pressures were normal in 91.8% and 93.2% of the children, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: These findings showed the important role of school health nurses in performing health screenings directed at visually impaired children who constitute a special group for school health services. Health screening for height, weight, dental health, hearing, and scoliosis is suggested for visually impaired children.
Adolescent ; Blood Pressure ; Body Height ; Body Weight ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; *Disabled Persons ; Female ; Hearing ; Humans ; Male ; Mass Screening/*methods ; Oral Health ; School Health Services/*organization & administration ; Scoliosis/*diagnosis ; Socioeconomic Factors ; Surveys and Questionnaires ; Turkey ; *Visually Impaired Persons

Child ; Child Health Services ; organization & administration ; trends ; Forecasting ; Humans ; Singapore

OBJECTIVETo study the efficacy of community management model of bronchial asthma in children.

METHODThrough community outreach and clinic, 120 cases of children with asthma were enrolled from the 11 000 children aged 0 to 14 in Zhanlanlu area, and a community management model of asthma was established according to the Global Initiative for Asthma requirements combined with the actual situation of the community, both physicians and patients participated in case identification, file creation, and long-term standardized management. Through repeated medical education, the telephone hotline and interactive network of asthma among physicians, children and parents, a physician-patient relationship was established. The data of standardized medication, scheduled re-visit to the hospital, frequency of asthma attacks, antibiotic use, medical expenses, the loss of parents work hours etc. before and after the implementation of community management model were analyzed and compared.

RESULTAfter implementation of community management model, the use of systemic corticosteroids (19.4%), oral medication (31.6%) was significantly lower than those before implementation (68.3% and 90.0%) (χ(2) = 51.9, 41.1, P < 0.01), use of inhaled corticosteroids (76.5%) and oral leukotriene receptor antagonist (79.6%) was significantly higher compared with control and before management level (10.0%), χ(2) = 106.0, P < 0.01. The days of attacks of asthma (4.6 ± 2.3), the use of antibiotics (16.2 ± 6.1), (5.7 ± 2.9) and the cost of treatment significantly decreased. In 16 cases (13.3%) two-way referral was applied. In this study, the dropout rate was 18.3%, by telephone and network supervision of lost cases, re-education, made some children return to management, eventually the dropout rate was 9.2%.

CONCLUSIONEnrollment of children with bronchial asthma into community management model made the children adhere to the management regularly and a standardized management was achieved.

Adolescent ; Adrenal Cortex Hormones ; administration & dosage ; therapeutic use ; Anti-Asthmatic Agents ; administration & dosage ; therapeutic use ; Asthma ; drug therapy ; therapy ; Child ; Child Health Services ; methods ; organization & administration ; Child, Preschool ; Community Health Services ; methods ; organization & administration ; Community Networks ; Disease Management ; Drug Administration Schedule ; Female ; Humans ; Infant ; Infant, Newborn ; Male ; Patient Compliance ; Patient Education as Topic ; organization & administration ; Self Care

Health technology assessment was first introduced to the Republic of Korea in 2006 by amending the Medical Services Act. The Committee of New Health Technology Assessment (CNHTA) is the ministerial committee that has the responsibility of reviewing the safety and effectiveness of new health technology. CNHTA review plays a gatekeeping role for new health technology in Korea, which can increase the burden on patients in Korea, either by out-of pocket payments or co-pays for National Health Insurance covered service. This kind of gatekeeping is a function of the healthcare system in many countries where no financial cap such as a fixed budget or diagnosis-related group payment is applied. However, it has been argued that gatekeeping works against industrial promotion policy. The one-stop service introduced in 2014 is a system similar to US parallel review between the US Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. This service provides a simultaneous process of regulatory review by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, identification of existing technology by the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Services, and new health technology assessment by the National Evidence-based Healthcare Collaborating Agency and the Ministry of Health and Welfare. This service is expected to reduce the total review process by 3 to12 months. A limited health technology appointment service was introduced in April 2014. This service designates orphan health technologies and health technologies for rare and incurable diseases and supports evidence development at designated hospitals. Several countries have similar systems: US Coverage with Evidence Development, Canadian Conditionally Funded Field Evaluation, UK Only in Research, and many others. The future direction of Health technology assessment should focus on the life cycle management of health technology. A consistent, continuous, and transformative mechanism to manage from the research and development of health technology to delisting obsolete technology to make room for new innovative technology is warranted.
Biomedical Technology* ; Budgets ; Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (U.S.) ; Child ; Child, Orphaned ; Delivery of Health Care ; Diagnosis-Related Groups ; Financial Management ; Gatekeeping ; Humans ; Insurance, Health ; Korea ; Life Cycle Stages ; National Health Programs ; Republic of Korea ; United States Food and Drug Administration

INTRODUCTIONDepression affects more women than men in Malaysia. The objective of this paper was to determine the prevalence of depression and its associated factors among women attending a government primary care clinic.

METHODSA cross-sectional study was conducted in a government-funded primary care clinic in Malaysia. Consecutive adult female patients attending the clinic during the data collection period were invited to participate. The participants completed self-administered questionnaires (including the validated Patient Health Questionnaire [PHQ-9], which was translated into the Malay language).

RESULTSA total of 895 female patients participated in the study (response rate 87.5%). The prevalence of depression (PHQ-9 scores ≥ 10) was 12.1%. Based on multiple logistic regression analysis, certain stressful life events were found to be associated with depression (p < 0.05). These factors, arranged from highest to lowest risk, were financial problems (odds ratio [OR] 3.7, 95% confidence interval [CI] 2.2-6.2), unhappiness in the parent-child relationship (OR 3.0, 95% CI 1.2-7.5), history of serious illness (OR 2.4, 95% CI 1.1-5.2), unhappiness in family relationships (OR 2.3, 95% CI 1.1-4.7) and unhappiness at work (OR 2.2, 95% CI 1.1-4.3) (p < 0.05).

CONCLUSIONThe prevalence of depression among participants in this study was clinically significant and corresponded with the findings of other international studies. Factors associated with depression need to be highlighted and addressed accordingly. Clinicians in Malaysia should be aware of this prevalence when making diagnoses in primary care.

Adolescent ; Adult ; Aged ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Depression ; diagnosis ; epidemiology ; etiology ; Female ; Humans ; Malaysia ; Middle Aged ; Parent-Child Relations ; Prevalence ; Primary Health Care ; organization & administration ; Regression Analysis ; Risk ; Sex Factors ; Social Class ; Surveys and Questionnaires ; Urban Health Services ; Urban Population

Intellectual disability is known to be associated with a high incidence of psychiatric co-morbidity and problem behaviours. However, there are many challenges in trying to meet the mental health needs of people with an intellectual disability, and these are often not adequately addressed in Singapore's current healthcare system. This article outlines the present service provisions for this area in the country and details the importance of, as well as difficulties in the integration of health and social care measures in service development and delivery.
Adult ; Child ; Education, Special ; Health Services Accessibility ; Health Services Needs and Demand ; Humans ; Intellectual Disability ; epidemiology ; rehabilitation ; therapy ; Intelligence Tests ; Mental Health ; Mental Health Services ; organization & administration ; Mentally Disabled Persons ; Program Development ; Quality of Health Care ; Singapore

AIMThe objective of this discussion paper is to investigate whether the experience gained through the German paradigm shift in dental care can be of benefit in China's deliberations on the introduction of universal dental care for its people. METHODOLOGY A comparison of representative oral health outcome data from China and Germany, two countries at different stages in their development, is presented here in order to analyse whether the findings meet expected outcome and confirm the presumption that more developed countries perform better.

RESULTSThe epidemiological comparison reveals surprising findings concerning the severity of dental diseases and, in particular, missing teeth per person in adults and rates of total edentulousness in seniors. In all of these areas German adults and seniors show significantly inferior outcomes compared with the Chinese population. The main reason for these striking discrepancies, as it turned out, is the decisive role played by the treatment philosophies and strategies of German dentists.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONSIf dentists take a less interventionist approach, checking as well as treating dental diseases with preventive and strictly tooth-preserving methods, dental treatment results in oral health. Under these conditions it can be assumed that modern dentistry is generally good for the teeth. These findings are important for developing countries that are seeking to integrate dental care into their health care system. On the basis of long-term experience from highly industrialized Western countries and especially from Germany we will attempt to put forward proposals for creating an effective and efficient dental care system in China.

Adolescent ; Adult ; Aged ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; China ; epidemiology ; Community Dentistry ; Delivery of Health Care ; organization & administration ; Dental Caries ; epidemiology ; Dental Health Services ; organization & administration ; Dentists ; supply & distribution ; Germany ; epidemiology ; Health Care Reform ; Health Policy ; Health Priorities ; Health Transition ; Humans ; Insurance, Health ; Middle Aged ; Mouth, Edentulous ; epidemiology ; Oral Health ; Outcome Assessment (Health Care) ; Periodontal Diseases ; epidemiology ; Philosophy, Dental ; Preventive Dentistry ; Reimbursement Mechanisms ; Tooth Loss ; epidemiology ; Universal Coverage ; organization & administration ; Young Adult