Thomas Bossert
Biographic Data
| ID | 1727645 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Thomas Bossert |
| GIVEN NAMES | Thomas |
| FAMILY NAME | Bossert |
| SIGNATURE | BOSSERT T |
| AFFILIATIONS | Harvard University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3056-9543 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 32 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 216 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 32 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1979 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2023 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Examining decentralization and managerial decision making for child immunization program performance in India
Developing a conceptual framework for implementation science to evaluate a nutrition intervention scaled-up in a real-world setting
Objective: The aim of this paper is to identify and develop a comprehensive conceptual framework using implementation science that can be applied to assess a nutrition intervention in a real-world setting. Design: We conducted a narrative review using electronic databases and a manual search to identify implementation science frameworks, models and theories published in peer-reviewed journals. We performed a qualitative thematic analysis of these…
Role of home visits by volunteer community health workers
Objective: We assessed the role of home visits by Shasthya Shebika (SS) – female volunteer community health workers (CHWs) – in improving the distribution of micronutrient powder (MNP), and explored the independent effects of caregiver–provider interaction on coverage variables. Design: We used data from three cross-sectional surveys undertaken at baseline ( n 1927), midline ( n 1924) and endline ( n 1540) as part of an evaluation of a home forti…
Factors associated with home visits by volunteer community health workers to implement a home-fortification intervention in Bangladesh
Objective: BRAC, an international development organization based in Bangladesh, engages community health workers called Shasthya Shebikas (SS) to implement home fortification of foods with micronutrient powders (MNP). We identified factors associated with home visits by SS, at different levels of the BRAC programme-delivery hierarchy, to implement home-fortification interventions. Design: We conducted a cross-sectional survey, semi-structured int…
Can complex programs be sustained? A mixed methods sustainability evaluation of a national infant and young child feeding program in Bangladesh and Vietnam
The inclusion of multiple activities in A&T and efforts to integrate the program into existing institutions were seen as crucial to its success but also made it difficult to sustain, particularly given unstable financial support and human resource constraints. Future complex programs should carefully plan for institutionalization in advance of the program by cultivating champions across the health system, and designing unique and complementary ro…
Health service delivery and political trust in Nigeria
Do improvements in health service delivery affect trust in political leaders in Africa? Citizens expect their government to provide social services. Intuitively, improvements in service delivery should lead to higher levels of trust in and support for political leaders. However, in contexts where inadequate services are the norm, and where political support is linked to ethnic or religious affiliation, there may be weak linkages between improveme…
Distrusting community health workers with confidential health information
BACKGROUND: Patients are unlikely to share the personal information that is critical for effective healthcare, if they do not trust that this information will remain confidential. Trust in confidentiality may be particularly low in interactions with community health workers (CHW) because CHW deliver healthcare outside the clinic setting. This study aims to determine the proportion of Swaziland's population that does not trust the national CHW cad…
Promise of Development
Introduction * Lost Promise: Explaining Latin American Underdevelopment Peter F. Klarn. Modernization * Values, Education and Entrepreneurship Seymour Martin Lipset. * The Politics of Social and Economic Change in Latin America Kalman H. Silvert. * Political Change in Latin America: The Emergence of the Middle Sectors John J. Johnson. * Responsibility of the Latifundios for Lags in Social Development Jacques Lambert. Dependency And Marxism * The …
Global Fund investments in human resources for health
BACKGROUND: Since the early 2000s, there have been large increases in donor financing of human resources for health (HRH), yet few studies have examined their effects on health systems. OBJECTIVE: To determine the scope and impact of investments in HRH by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Global Fund), the largest investor in HRH outside national governments. METHODS: We used mixed research methodology to analyse budget all…
Health sector decentralization and local decision-making
Building social capital in post-conflict communities
Is decentralization good for logistics systems? Evidence on essential medicine logistics in Ghana and Guatemala
Efficient logistics systems move essential medicines down the supply chain to the service delivery point, and then to the end user. Experts on logistics systems tend to see the supply chain as requiring centralized control to be most effective. However, many health reforms have involved decentralization, which experts fear has disrupted the supply chain and made systems less effective. There is no consensus on an appropriate methodology for asses…
Measuring dimensions of social capital
Crucial Needs, Weak Incentives
The role of law in public health
Reaching the Health MDGs with Human Resource Reforms
Decentralization in Zambia
Zambia implemented an ambitious process of health sector decentralization in the mid 1990s. This article presents an assessment of the degree of decentralization, called 'decision space', that was allowed to districts in Zambia, and an analysis of data on districts available at the national level to assess allocation choices made by local authorities and some indicators of the performance of the health systems under decentralization. The Zambian …
Decentralization of health systems in Ghana, Zambia, Uganda and the Philippines
This study reviews the experience of decentralization in four developing countries: Ghana, Uganda, Zambia and the Philippines. It uses two analytical frameworks to describe and compare the types and degrees of decentralization in each country. The first framework specifies three types of decentralization: deconcentration, delegation and devolution. The second framework uses a principal agent approach and innovative maps of 'decision space' to def…
Decentralization of health systems in Latin America
Decentralization is often a major part of health reform policies. However, there have been few attempts to comparatively study the degree of decentralization and the effects of decentralization on equity of allocations to health, so we do not know how best to implement this reform. This article uses an innovative comparative analysis of the "decision space" that was allowed to local municipalities in the health reforms of Bolivia and Chile, two c…
Transformation of ministries of health in the era of health reform
Ministries of health are being called upon to lead major health reforms; at the same time they must reform themselves to become more modern institutions and assume new and different functions and roles in the more dynamic reformed system. The literature on public administration and on health reform has recommended many processes of institutional reform and development, building on private sector management techniques, popularized by 'reinventing …
Analyzing the decentralization of health systems in developing countries
Total quality management in the public sector
Chile's health sector reform
Bottom-up’ planning in Indonesia
Decentralization and ‘bottom-up’ planning have been objectives of many projects in recent years. This article examines the implementation of one project - the Comprehensive Health Improvement Program-Province Specific (CHIPPS) - which was partially effective in promoting decentralization to the provincial and local levels in the Indonesian Ministry of Health (MOH). The Indonesian MOH is a highly centralized bureaucracy which manages a far-flung b…
Can they get along without us? Sustainability of donor-supported health projects in Central America and Africa
Analyzing the decentralization of health systems in developing countries
Building social capital in post-conflict communities
Can they get along without us? Sustainability of donor-supported health projects in Central America and Africa
Measuring dimensions of social capital
Health sector decentralization and local decision-making
Can We Return to the Regime for Comparative Policy Analysis? Or, The State and Health Policy in Central America
Students of comparative public policy analysis often hear statements like those of the policymaking officials cited above. Officials often offer their explanations for the differences in policy among nations by focusing on the political regime. Although policymakers themselves view political regime characteristics as important, comparative policy analysts have generally avoided explanations at this level. From a variety of methodological perspect…
The role of law in public health
Promise of Development
Introduction * Lost Promise: Explaining Latin American Underdevelopment Peter F. Klarn. Modernization * Values, Education and Entrepreneurship Seymour Martin Lipset. * The Politics of Social and Economic Change in Latin America Kalman H. Silvert. * Political Change in Latin America: The Emergence of the Middle Sectors John J. Johnson. * Responsibility of the Latifundios for Lags in Social Development Jacques Lambert. Dependency And Marxism * The …
The political and administrative context of primary health care in the third world
Nicaraguan Health Policy
Global Fund investments in human resources for health
BACKGROUND: Since the early 2000s, there have been large increases in donor financing of human resources for health (HRH), yet few studies have examined their effects on health systems. OBJECTIVE: To determine the scope and impact of investments in HRH by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Global Fund), the largest investor in HRH outside national governments. METHODS: We used mixed research methodology to analyse budget all…
Is decentralization good for logistics systems? Evidence on essential medicine logistics in Ghana and Guatemala
Efficient logistics systems move essential medicines down the supply chain to the service delivery point, and then to the end user. Experts on logistics systems tend to see the supply chain as requiring centralized control to be most effective. However, many health reforms have involved decentralization, which experts fear has disrupted the supply chain and made systems less effective. There is no consensus on an appropriate methodology for asses…
Health-Policy Innovation and International Assistance in Central America
For over a decade, international health activities have emphasized primary health care (PHC) as a priority policy for health care delivery in the Third World. During the 1970s, a general consensus onthe central goals and activities of this policy emerged in international health meetings. ' PHC, a policy model designed to provide relatively low-cost services first in underserved rural areas and then in marginal urban areas, involves training auxil…
Bottom-up’ planning in Indonesia
Decentralization and ‘bottom-up’ planning have been objectives of many projects in recent years. This article examines the implementation of one project - the Comprehensive Health Improvement Program-Province Specific (CHIPPS) - which was partially effective in promoting decentralization to the provincial and local levels in the Indonesian Ministry of Health (MOH). The Indonesian MOH is a highly centralized bureaucracy which manages a far-flung b…
Health and Health Care in Latin America
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The Agrarian Reform and Peasant Political Consciousness in Chile
It has been argued that agrarian reform is a reformist strategy for undermining the revolutionary potential of the peasantry. By granting landownership to the landless it risks turning them into a petty-bourgeois kulak class which identifies its interests with those of larger property owners.1 While some observers suggest that agrarian reform also can cultivate (Petras and LaPorte, 1971), the revolutionary effect of such reforms is usually seen a…
Can We Return to the Regime for Comparative Policy Analysis? Or, The State and Health Policy in Central America
Students of comparative public policy analysis often hear statements like those of the policymaking officials cited above. Officials often offer their explanations for the differences in policy among nations by focusing on the political regime. Although policymakers themselves view political regime characteristics as important, comparative policy analysts have generally avoided explanations at this level. From a variety of methodological perspect…
The political and administrative context of primary health care in the third world
Health-Policy Innovation and International Assistance in Central America
For over a decade, international health activities have emphasized primary health care (PHC) as a priority policy for health care delivery in the Third World. During the 1970s, a general consensus onthe central goals and activities of this policy emerged in international health meetings. ' PHC, a policy model designed to provide relatively low-cost services first in underserved rural areas and then in marginal urban areas, involves training auxil…
Nicaraguan Health Policy
Promise of Development
Can they get along without us? Sustainability of donor-supported health projects in Central America and Africa
Bottom-up’ planning in Indonesia
Decentralization and ‘bottom-up’ planning have been objectives of many projects in recent years. This article examines the implementation of one project - the Comprehensive Health Improvement Program-Province Specific (CHIPPS) - which was partially effective in promoting decentralization to the provincial and local levels in the Indonesian Ministry of Health (MOH). The Indonesian MOH is a highly centralized bureaucracy which manages a far-flung b…
Chile's health sector reform
Total quality management in the public sector
Transformation of ministries of health in the era of health reform
Ministries of health are being called upon to lead major health reforms; at the same time they must reform themselves to become more modern institutions and assume new and different functions and roles in the more dynamic reformed system. The literature on public administration and on health reform has recommended many processes of institutional reform and development, building on private sector management techniques, popularized by 'reinventing …
Analyzing the decentralization of health systems in developing countries
Decentralization of health systems in Latin America
Decentralization is often a major part of health reform policies. However, there have been few attempts to comparatively study the degree of decentralization and the effects of decentralization on equity of allocations to health, so we do not know how best to implement this reform. This article uses an innovative comparative analysis of the "decision space" that was allowed to local municipalities in the health reforms of Bolivia and Chile, two c…
Decentralization of health systems in Ghana, Zambia, Uganda and the Philippines
This study reviews the experience of decentralization in four developing countries: Ghana, Uganda, Zambia and the Philippines. It uses two analytical frameworks to describe and compare the types and degrees of decentralization in each country. The first framework specifies three types of decentralization: deconcentration, delegation and devolution. The second framework uses a principal agent approach and innovative maps of 'decision space' to def…
Decentralization in Zambia
Zambia implemented an ambitious process of health sector decentralization in the mid 1990s. This article presents an assessment of the degree of decentralization, called 'decision space', that was allowed to districts in Zambia, and an analysis of data on districts available at the national level to assess allocation choices made by local authorities and some indicators of the performance of the health systems under decentralization. The Zambian …
Reaching the Health MDGs with Human Resource Reforms
Crucial Needs, Weak Incentives
The role of law in public health
Is decentralization good for logistics systems? Evidence on essential medicine logistics in Ghana and Guatemala
Efficient logistics systems move essential medicines down the supply chain to the service delivery point, and then to the end user. Experts on logistics systems tend to see the supply chain as requiring centralized control to be most effective. However, many health reforms have involved decentralization, which experts fear has disrupted the supply chain and made systems less effective. There is no consensus on an appropriate methodology for asses…
Measuring dimensions of social capital
Building social capital in post-conflict communities
Health sector decentralization and local decision-making
Global Fund investments in human resources for health
BACKGROUND: Since the early 2000s, there have been large increases in donor financing of human resources for health (HRH), yet few studies have examined their effects on health systems. OBJECTIVE: To determine the scope and impact of investments in HRH by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Global Fund), the largest investor in HRH outside national governments. METHODS: We used mixed research methodology to analyse budget all…
Distrusting community health workers with confidential health information
BACKGROUND: Patients are unlikely to share the personal information that is critical for effective healthcare, if they do not trust that this information will remain confidential. Trust in confidentiality may be particularly low in interactions with community health workers (CHW) because CHW deliver healthcare outside the clinic setting. This study aims to determine the proportion of Swaziland's population that does not trust the national CHW cad…
Political science (23 works) · Economics (20 works) · Business (17 works) · Global Maternal and Child Health (17 works) · Economic growth (15 works) · Medicine (14 works) · Healthcare Systems and Reforms (12 works) · Public Administration (12 works) · Sociology (10 works) · Decentralization (9 works)