La ville d’Abidjan est localisée au Sud de la Côte d’Ivoire. Elle est la capitale économique depuis 1983 et la première ville du pays. Elle concentre le potentiel humain et une offre de soins dense et diversifiée répartie sur de faibles distances physiques, donnant l’impression que tout est accessible. En effet, l’État Ivoirien a consenti d’importants investissements pour construire et équiper des services de santé depuis l’émergence de la ville au début du siècle dernier pour améliorer l’accès aux soins des abidjanais. Pourtant, malgré une augmentation considérable du nombre d’infrastructures sanitaires et de leur disponibilité, les taux d’utilisations et de fréquentations des services de santé modernes dans les communes de la ville d’Abidjan restent faibles et les indicateurs de santé demeurent très préoccupants et les besoins de soins sont importants. En plus, la croissance spatiale et démographique accélérée que connaît la ville entraînent des changements rapides dans son organisation territoriale empêchant les autorités publiques chargées de la planification de suivre le rythme de sa croissance urbaine. Ils ne sont pas toujours parvenus à équiper en services urbains les nouveaux espaces au fur et à mesure de leur création et à intégrer les nouveaux citadins aux origines diverses. Cette thèse permet d’étudier, comment, dans un contexte considéré comme privilégié, se pose la problématique de l’accès et du recours aux services de santé modernes. Pour réaliser ce projet, cette étude, à partir des combinaisons d’analyses spatiales, statistiques, et d’un travail de terrain, analyse les inégalités socio-spatiales d’accès aux services de santé pour mettre en exergue le problème de l’accessibilité aux soins, tant physique, culturelle, matérielle que sociale. Elle mesure également l’adéquation de cette offre de soins moderne aux besoins de soins des populations pour identifier les zones et les populations défavorisées pour l’accès aux soins. Et enfin, cette étude analyse les pratiques citadines du recours aux soins, ainsi que les déterminants qui limitent ou facilitent l’accès aux soins dans la ville d’Abidjan. Les résultats des études montrent que les services de santé existent, ils sont denses et diversifiés, mais ils ne sont pas repartis là où il y a le plus de besoins de soins. Dans notre étude, on souligne aussi une prédominance de la prise en charge à domicile des épisodes morbides notamment à travers l’automédication et une diminution de l’utilisation des services de soins modernes. Le recours aux structures de soins se fait rare dans les quartiers où les besoins en soins de santé sont les plus importants. L’automédication ou la médecine de rue sont généralement les plus privilégiées. Les structures de soins sont sollicitées que lorsque la maladie devient très grave. Nos résultats montrent également qu’il est difficile d’attribuer à un facteur le rôle déterminant des recours thérapeutiques, car les comportements sont à la fois déterminés par les caractéristiques socio-démographiques de l’individu, de sa famille et par des paramètres contextuels, mais aussi par les caractéristiques de l’épisode morbide, par la connaissance du système de soins environnant et les attitudes vis-à-vis du système de soins. Néanmoins, nous pouvons dire qu’à Abidjan, les pratiques citadines du recours aux soins sont tributaires de la capacité économique des ménages avec le risque accru de marginaliser les personnes les plus vulnérables. / The city of Abidjan is located in the South of the Ivory Coast. It is the economic capital since 1983 and the first city of the country. It concentrates human potential and health of dense care supply modern and diversified divided on weak physical distance, giving the impression that everything is approachable. In effect, the State Of the Ivory Coast approved important investments to construct and equip services of health care since the emergence of the city at the beginning of last century to ameliorate the access to health care of abidjanais. However, in spite of a considerable increase among health facilities and among their availability, the rates of uses and company of the services of modern health care in the spaces of the city of Abidjan remain weak and the indicators of health remain very worrying and the needs in care of health are important. On top of that, the space and demographic speeded up growth which knows the city draw away quick changes in her territorial organization preventing the public authorities made responsible with planning for following the rhythm of its urban growth. They did not always manage to equip new urban spaces with timely urban services and to integrate new citizens at the various origins. This thesis allows to be studying, how, in a considered context as privileged, settle the problems of access and health care seeking in the services of modern health. To accomplish this plan, this study, from the combination of spatial analysis, statistics, and field work, analyses the socio- spatial inequality of access to the services of health to head with the problem of accessibility in care, so physical, cultural, material that social. It also measures the adequacy of health care supply at the Needs in care of health of populations to identify zones and populations discriminated for the access to health care. And finally, this study analyses the city practices in the use of health care, as well as the determinants that hinder or facilitate access to health care in the city of Abidjan. Study results show that the services of health exist, they are dense and manifold, but they did not leave again where there are most needs in care of health. In our study, they also underline a predominance of the taking care at home of morbid episodes notably across self-medication and a reduction of the use of the services of modern care. The seeking in structures of health care becomes rare in the space where the needs in care of health are the most important. Self-medication or street medicine are the most favouring in general. Structures of health care are solicited that when illness becomes very serious. Our results also show that it is difficult to allocate to a factor the role determining therapeutic seeking, because behaviours are determined at the same time by the socio-demographic characteristics of the individual, his family and by contextual parameters, but also by the characteristics of morbid episode, by the knowledge of the ambient the health care system and attitudes in relation to the health care system. However, we can say that in Abidjan, the city practices of health care seeking are dependent on the economic capacity of household with risk augmented to marginalize the most vulnerable persons.

"The implementation of the TRIPS Agreement, within the wider context of globalisation, has brought about a conflict between the obligation of states to promote and protect health and the achievement of economic goals pursued under the WTO regime. Since trade is the driving engine of globalisation, it is imperative that, at the very least, rules governing it do not violate human rights but rather promote them. The problem of IP and the right to health therefore lies in ensuring that the integration of economic rules and institutional operations in relation to IPRs coincide with states’ obligations to promote and protect public health. ... This study centres on the specific debate about health and IPRs in the context of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) and the WTO rules on IP protection. In terms of a human rights approach to the TRIPS Agreement, the ICESCR has been chosen for several reasons. First, the ICESCR specifically recognises both the right to health and the right to the protection of inventions in clearer terms than any other human rights instrument. Secondly, at least 111 of the state parties to the ICESCR are also members of the WTO including a large number of developing countries. Thirdly, if one sees the ICESCR as a vehicle for the fulfilment of the obligation to promote and protect human rights under the United Nations Organisation’s (UN) Charter, it can be argued that in line with article 103, the implementation and interpretation of TRIPS by all UN members states must take into account basic human rights. However, even with primary focus being on the ICESCR, most of the discussion on practical issues will focus on the experiences in Sub-Saharan Africa because the inequalities and problems of access to health care are most dramatically played out in this part of the world. The objective of the study is to examine the relationship between the obligation of states to progressively realise and guarantee the right to health, and the IP rules under the TRIPS Agreement. The specific objective is to examine the relationship between the exceptions under the TRIPS Agreement and the obligation to protect health and the identification of a consistent way of achieving a convergence between the implementation and interpretation of the rules of the two regimes in the area of health." -- Chapter 1 / Mini Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2001. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

No description available.

Problématique : L’amélioration de l’accessibilité financière aux soins de santé est essentielle pour réduire la morbidité et de la mortalité infantile dans les pays à ressources limitées. Cependant, les preuves disponibles sur la relation entre un accès accru aux soins et l’amélioration la santé infantile, dans le long terme, demeurent insuffisantes et parfois inconnues. Dans le contexte spécifique de la région du Sahel au Burkina Faso où les niveaux élevés de morbidité et de malnutrition coïncident avec un faible recours aux soins, une intervention de santé publique associant la gratuité des soins à l’amélioration de la qualité des soins et à la prise en charge de la malnutrition dans la communauté a été mise en œuvre en septembre 2008. Objectifs : En utilisant des approches statistiques et épidémiologiques appliquées aux données transversales et de séries chronologiques, cette thèse vise à apporter une meilleure compréhension de la façon dont la présence de l’intervention dans les communautés peut augmenter et maintenir l’utilisation des services de santé à long terme et améliorer la santé des enfants de moins de cinq ans. Les objectifs spécifiques sont : 1) évaluer le maintien à long terme des effets de l’intervention sur l’utilisation des services de santé chez les enfants de moins de cinq ans, 2) évaluer l’effet contextuel de l’intervention, quatre ans après le début de sa mise en œuvre, sur la probabilité de survenue d’une maladie et sur la probabilité d’utilisation des services de santé chez les enfants de moins de cinq ans, et 3) évaluer l’effet contextuel de l’intervention, quatre ans après le début de sa mise en œuvre, sur le retard de croissance chez les enfants de moins de cinq ans. Méthodes : Les données proviennent du système national d’information sanitaire, d’une enquête rétrospective sur les services de santé ainsi que d’une enquête de ménages réalisée quatre ans après le début de l’intervention dans 41 villages du district d’intervention et 51 villages du district de comparaison. Nous avons utilisé un plan quasi expérimental à séries temporelles interrompues avec groupe de comparaison pour évaluer les effets immédiats et à long terme de l’intervention sur les taux d’utilisation des services de santé. Ensuite, un plan d’étude transversale post-intervention avec un groupe de comparaison nous a permis d’évaluer l’effet contextuel de l’intervention sur la probabilité de survenue d’une maladie, sur la probabilité d’utilisation des services de santé et sur le retard de croissance chez les enfants de moins de cinq ans. La stratégie analytique a combiné la méthode de pondération par les scores de propension pour équilibrer les covariables entre les deux groupes, la modélisation binomiale négative à effets mixtes, les régressions linéaire et logistique multiniveaux. Résultats : L’intervention de gratuité des soins associée à l’amélioration de la qualité des soins et à la prise en charge de la malnutrition dans la communauté était associée à l’augmentation et au maintien de l’utilisation des services de santé au-delà de quatre ans (ratio des taux d’incidence = 2,33 ; IC 95 % = 1,98 – 2,67). En outre, comparativement aux enfants vivant dans le district de contrôle, la probabilité d’utiliser les services de santé était de 17,2 % plus élevée chez les enfants vivant dans le district d’intervention (IC 95 % = 15,01–26,6) ; et de 20,7 % plus élevée lorsque l’épisode de maladie était sévère (IC 95 % = 9,9–31,5). Ces associations étaient significatives, quels que soient la distance par rapport aux centres de santé et le statut socio-économique du ménage. Par ailleurs, alors que le contexte de résidence expliquait 9,36 % de la variance du retard de croissance (corrélation intraclasse = 9,36 % ; IC 95 % = 6,45–13,38), la présence de l’intervention dans les villages n’explique que 2 % de la variance du retard de croissance. Cependant, nous n’avons pas pu démontrer que la présence de l’intervention dans les communautés était associée à une réduction de la probabilité de survenue d’un épisode de maladie (Différentiel des probabilités = 4.4 ; IC 95% = -1.0 – 9.8), ni à une amélioration significative de l’état nutritionnel des enfants de moins de cinq ans (RC = 1,13 ; IC 95 % = 0,83–1,54). Conclusion : Cette thèse souligne que la gratuité des soins associée à l’amélioration de la qualité des soins et à la prise en charge de la malnutrition dans la communauté est efficace pour augmenter et maintenir l’utilisation des services de santé et réduire les inégalités géographiques de recours aux soins. Cependant, cette intervention n’était pas associée à une amélioration des résultats de santé infantile. Bien que des études longitudinales rigoureuses soient nécessaires pour comprendre pleinement l’influence potentielle de cette intervention sur la morbidité, cette thèse plaide pour la nécessité d’agir simultanément sur les autres déterminants sociaux de la santé et d’intégrer, de manière synergique, des interventions spécifiques à la nutrition pour plus d’impact sur la santé infantile. / Introduction: Improving financial access to health care is believed to be essential for reducing the burden of child morbidity and mortality in resource-limited settings, but the available evidence on the relationship between increased access and health remains scarce and the long-term issues are still unknown. In the specific context of the Sahel region in Burkina Faso where high levels of morbidity and malnutrition coincide with low health care use, a pilot intervention for free health care including quality of care improvement and management of malnutrition at the community level was implemented in September 2008. Objectives: Using statistical and epidemiological approaches applied to cross-sectional and time series data, this thesis aims to provide a better understanding of how the presence of intervention in communities can increase and maintain long-term use of health services and improve the health of children under five years. The specific objectives are: 1) to evaluate the long-term effects of the intervention on the use of health services in children under the age of five, 2) to estimate the contextual effect of intervention on the probability of occurrence of and the likelihood of health services being used by children under five, four years after the start of its implementation, and 3) to evaluate the contextual effect of the intervention on stunting in children under five, four years after the start of its implementation. Methods: The data for the analyses were provided from a variety of sources including the national health information system, a retrospective health services survey, and a household survey conducted four years after the intervention onset in 41 villages in the intervention district and 51 villages in the comparison district. We used a quasi-experimental controlled interrupted time-series design group to analyze the immediate and long-term effects of the intervention on the rate of health services utilization in children under five. Then, a quasi-experimental post-test-only design that included a control group allowed us to evaluate the contextual effect of the intervention on the probability of occurrence of a disease, on the probability of use of health services, and stunting in children under five. The analytic strategy combined the propensity score weighting method to balance the covariates between the two groups, two-level mixed-effects negative binomial, and linear and logistic regression models to account for the hierarchical structure of data. Results: The intervention for free health care including quality of care improvement and management of malnutrition at the community level was associated with an increased and maintained use of health services beyond four years after the onset of intervention (incidence rate ratio = 2.33; 95% CI = 1.98–2.67). In addition, compared to children living in the comparison district, the probability of using health services was 17.2% higher among those living in the intervention district (95% CI = 15.0–26.6); and 20.7% higher when the illness episode was severe (95% CI = 9.9–31.5). These associations were significant regardless of the distance to health centers and the socio-economic status of households. In addition, inequalities in the use of care were less pronounced in the intervention villages compared to those in the control village. Finally, the results also showed that the residence context accounted for 9.36% of the variance in stunting (intra-class correlation = 9.36% ; 95% CI = 6.45–13.38), and only 2% of the variance in stunting was explained by the intervention. However, we could not demonstrate that the intervention in these communities was associated with a reduced probability of an illness occurring (AME=4.4 (95% CI: -1.0 – 9.8), nor with a significant improvement in the nutritional status among children under five (OR = 1.13; 95% CI = 0.83–1.54). Conclusion: This thesis underlines the importance that affordable health care, including quality of care, as well as improving the management of malnutrition at the community level, are effective in increasing and maintaining the use of health services and reduce geographical inequalities in the use of care. However, this intervention was not associated with improved child health outcomes. Although rigorous longitudinal studies are necessary to fully understand the potential influence of this intervention on morbidity, this thesis highlights the need to simultaneously act on other social determinants of health and to synergistically integrate nutrition-specific interventions for greater impact on child health.

“Why do immigrants and refugees need community health workers/lay health workers (CHWs) if Canada already has a universal health care system?” Abundant evidence demonstrates that despite the universality of our health care system marginalized populations, including immigrants and refugees, experience barriers to accessing the health system. Evidence on the role of CHWs facilitating access is both lacking and urgently needed. This dissertation contributes to this evidence by providing a thick description and thorough analytical exploration of a CHW model, in Edmonton, Canada. Specifically, I examine the activities of the Multicultural Health Brokers Co-operative (MCHB Co-op) and its Multicultural Health Brokers from 1992 to 2011 as well as the relationship they have with Alberta Health Services (AHS) Edmonton Zone Public Health. The research for this study is based on an instrumental and embedded qualitative case study design. The case is the MCHB Co-op, an independently-run multicultural health worker co-operative, which contracts with health and social services providers in Edmonton to offer linguistically- and culturally-appropriate services to marginalized immigrant and refugee women and their families. The two embedded mini-cases are two programs of the MCHB Co-op: Perinatal Outreach and Health for Two, which are the raison d’être for a sustained partnership between the MCHB Co-op and AHS. The phenomenon under study is the Multicultural Health Brokers’ practice. I triangulate multiple methods (research strategies and data sources), including 46 days of participant and direct observation, 44 in-depth interviews (with Multicultural Health Brokers, mentors, women using the programs, health professionals and outsiders who knew of the work of the MCHB Co-op and Multicultural Health Brokers), and document review and analysis of policy documents, yearly reports, training manuals, educational materials as well as quantitative analysis of the Health Brokers’ 3,442 client caseload database. In addition, data include my field notes of both descriptive and analytical reflections taken throughout the onsite research. I also triangulate various theoretical frameworks to explore how historically specific social structures, economic relationships, and ideological assumptions serve to create and reinforce the conditions that give rise to the need for CHWs, and the factors that aid or hinder their ability to facilitate marginalized populations’ access to health and social services. Findings reveal that Multicultural Health Brokers facilitate access to health and social services as well as foster community capacity building in order to address settlement, adaptation, and integration of immigrant and refugee women and their families into Canadian society. Findings also demonstrate that the Multicultural Health Broker model is an example of collaboration between community-based organizations and local systems in targeting health equity for marginalized populations; in particular, in perinatal health and violence against women. A major problem these workers face is they provide important services as part of Canada’s health human resources workforce, but their contributions are often not recognized as such. The triangulation of methods and theory provides empirical and theoretical understanding of the Multicultural Health Brokers’ contribution to immigrant and refugee women and their families’ feminist urban citizenship.

“Why do immigrants and refugees need community health workers/lay health workers (CHWs) if Canada already has a universal health care system?” Abundant evidence demonstrates that despite the universality of our health care system marginalized populations, including immigrants and refugees, experience barriers to accessing the health system. Evidence on the role of CHWs facilitating access is both lacking and urgently needed. This dissertation contributes to this evidence by providing a thick description and thorough analytical exploration of a CHW model, in Edmonton, Canada. Specifically, I examine the activities of the Multicultural Health Brokers Co-operative (MCHB Co-op) and its Multicultural Health Brokers from 1992 to 2011 as well as the relationship they have with Alberta Health Services (AHS) Edmonton Zone Public Health. The research for this study is based on an instrumental and embedded qualitative case study design. The case is the MCHB Co-op, an independently-run multicultural health worker co-operative, which contracts with health and social services providers in Edmonton to offer linguistically- and culturally-appropriate services to marginalized immigrant and refugee women and their families. The two embedded mini-cases are two programs of the MCHB Co-op: Perinatal Outreach and Health for Two, which are the raison d’être for a sustained partnership between the MCHB Co-op and AHS. The phenomenon under study is the Multicultural Health Brokers’ practice. I triangulate multiple methods (research strategies and data sources), including 46 days of participant and direct observation, 44 in-depth interviews (with Multicultural Health Brokers, mentors, women using the programs, health professionals and outsiders who knew of the work of the MCHB Co-op and Multicultural Health Brokers), and document review and analysis of policy documents, yearly reports, training manuals, educational materials as well as quantitative analysis of the Health Brokers’ 3,442 client caseload database. In addition, data include my field notes of both descriptive and analytical reflections taken throughout the onsite research. I also triangulate various theoretical frameworks to explore how historically specific social structures, economic relationships, and ideological assumptions serve to create and reinforce the conditions that give rise to the need for CHWs, and the factors that aid or hinder their ability to facilitate marginalized populations’ access to health and social services. Findings reveal that Multicultural Health Brokers facilitate access to health and social services as well as foster community capacity building in order to address settlement, adaptation, and integration of immigrant and refugee women and their families into Canadian society. Findings also demonstrate that the Multicultural Health Broker model is an example of collaboration between community-based organizations and local systems in targeting health equity for marginalized populations; in particular, in perinatal health and violence against women. A major problem these workers face is they provide important services as part of Canada’s health human resources workforce, but their contributions are often not recognized as such. The triangulation of methods and theory provides empirical and theoretical understanding of the Multicultural Health Brokers’ contribution to immigrant and refugee women and their families’ feminist urban citizenship.

“Why do immigrants and refugees need community health workers/lay health workers (CHWs) if Canada already has a universal health care system?” Abundant evidence demonstrates that despite the universality of our health care system marginalized populations, including immigrants and refugees, experience barriers to accessing the health system. Evidence on the role of CHWs facilitating access is both lacking and urgently needed. This dissertation contributes to this evidence by providing a thick description and thorough analytical exploration of a CHW model, in Edmonton, Canada. Specifically, I examine the activities of the Multicultural Health Brokers Co-operative (MCHB Co-op) and its Multicultural Health Brokers from 1992 to 2011 as well as the relationship they have with Alberta Health Services (AHS) Edmonton Zone Public Health. The research for this study is based on an instrumental and embedded qualitative case study design. The case is the MCHB Co-op, an independently-run multicultural health worker co-operative, which contracts with health and social services providers in Edmonton to offer linguistically- and culturally-appropriate services to marginalized immigrant and refugee women and their families. The two embedded mini-cases are two programs of the MCHB Co-op: Perinatal Outreach and Health for Two, which are the raison d’être for a sustained partnership between the MCHB Co-op and AHS. The phenomenon under study is the Multicultural Health Brokers’ practice. I triangulate multiple methods (research strategies and data sources), including 46 days of participant and direct observation, 44 in-depth interviews (with Multicultural Health Brokers, mentors, women using the programs, health professionals and outsiders who knew of the work of the MCHB Co-op and Multicultural Health Brokers), and document review and analysis of policy documents, yearly reports, training manuals, educational materials as well as quantitative analysis of the Health Brokers’ 3,442 client caseload database. In addition, data include my field notes of both descriptive and analytical reflections taken throughout the onsite research. I also triangulate various theoretical frameworks to explore how historically specific social structures, economic relationships, and ideological assumptions serve to create and reinforce the conditions that give rise to the need for CHWs, and the factors that aid or hinder their ability to facilitate marginalized populations’ access to health and social services. Findings reveal that Multicultural Health Brokers facilitate access to health and social services as well as foster community capacity building in order to address settlement, adaptation, and integration of immigrant and refugee women and their families into Canadian society. Findings also demonstrate that the Multicultural Health Broker model is an example of collaboration between community-based organizations and local systems in targeting health equity for marginalized populations; in particular, in perinatal health and violence against women. A major problem these workers face is they provide important services as part of Canada’s health human resources workforce, but their contributions are often not recognized as such. The triangulation of methods and theory provides empirical and theoretical understanding of the Multicultural Health Brokers’ contribution to immigrant and refugee women and their families’ feminist urban citizenship.