Heidi Fjeld
Biographic Data
| ID | 110000 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Heidi Fjeld |
| GIVEN NAMES | Heidi |
| FAMILY NAME | Fjeld |
| SIGNATURE | FJELD H |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Oslo |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0182-9155 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 27 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 11 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 27 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1999 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Producing antibiotic practices from guidelines, clinical assessment and health insurance in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania
Antibiotics are crucial medications for healthcare delivery. The regulatory frameworks that govern the prescription and consumption of antibiotics vary widely. In Tanzania, over-the-counter sales of antibiotics are illegal, yet widespread. In contrast, prescription of antibiotics in Tanzanian hospitals is constrained through regulatory tools, such as Standard Treatment Guidelines (STG). This paper examines what moves, limits and accelerates antib…
“Looking for life”
In this article we explore how artisanal gold miners in Western Kenya “look for life” in a landscape where precarity is not exceptional but part of everyday life. Drawing on ethnographic interviews with artisanal gold miners and participant observation, we examine how miners sustain both their livelihoods and lives whilst navigating precarity through relational, financial, practical, material and cosmological interventions in an agentive gold-min…
Increased risk of adverse maternal pregnancy outcomes among undocumented migrants in Norway
We use it a lot for everything
Increasing rates of antimicrobial resistance has accelerated global efforts to reduce antibiotic use. While antibiotic resistance poses a significant threat, especially in low-income settings, there is a scarcity of research on how people in such environments, including refugee camps, access and use antibiotics. This article explores factors that contribute to the shaping of antibiotic use in Shatila refugee camp in Lebanon. It is based on six mo…
Tribute to Signe Howell (1942-2025)
Professor Signe Howell passed away on 25 January, leaving a virtually unfillable void at the University of Oslo's Department of Social Anthropology, where she had been working since 1987. She joined us from the University of Edinburgh, coming as a welcome breath of fresh air with her combination of erudition, theoretical sophistication and a remarkable fascination with all things human. The latter trait had followed her since her childhood in the…
The hidden burden of dysmenorrhea among adolescent girls in Palestine refugee camps
Dysmenorrhea poses significant challenges to the well-being and academic performance of adolescent girls living in Palestine refugee camps. Collaborative efforts and multifaceted approaches are crucial to address dysmenorrhea effectively. This involves research, targeted interventions, culturally sensitive strategies, and fostering a supportive environment that empowers girls to thrive academically and beyond
Perinatal mortality among pregnant undocumented migrants in Norway 1999-2020
Being undocumented is strongly associated with perinatal mortality in the offspring. Disparities were not explained by maternal origin or maternal health factors, indicating that social determinants of health through delays in receiving adequate care and factors negatively influencing gestational length may be of importance
It is the child with the big head’ – Primary healthcare providers’ perceptions of paediatric hydrocephalus in Blantyre, Malawi
Children in Africa are disproportionately burdened by the neurosurgical condition hydrocephalus. In Blantyre, Malawi, paediatric hydrocephalus represents the majority of surgical procedures performed in the neurosurgical department at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital. To reduce morbidity and mortality, timely detection followed by referral from surrounding primary health centres is crucial. Aiming to explore perceptions and identify enablers and …
Chasing dön spirits in Tibetan medical encounters
Although spirit possession is generally considered a psychiatric illness, the class of conditions designated as dön (Tib. gdon, 'afflictive external influences,' often glossed as 'spirit affliction') in Tibetan medicine represents a distinctive paradigm for an etiology where physical and mental facets inhere in every illness. This study draws upon ethnographic fieldwork in eastern Tibet to examine two conditions that represent illness presentatio…
Food-based nutrition counselling and education intervention for improved diets of pregnant women in rural Malawi
Objective: We wanted to identify factors related to dietary behavioural change among impoverished pregnant women in the face of nutrition education and counselling, describing what creates an enabling environment and barriers for dietary change. Design: We used qualitative data from a cluster-randomised maternal education trial and conducted a thematic analysis using a social ecological framework to describe the factors that influenced dietary ad…
Deservingness
This article brings the social science concept of ‘deservingness’ to bear on clinical cases of transnational migrant patients. Based on the authors’ medical social science research, health delivery practice and clinical work from multiple locations in Africa. Europe and the Americas, the article describes three clinical cases in which assumptions of deservingness have significant implications for the morbidity and mortality of migrant patients. T…
Kinship and the State in Tibet and Its Borderlands
Relations as Potential
Across the Tibetan ethnographic region, not only marriage but kinship more broadly is formed, maintained and explained in heterogeneous and sometimes contradictory ways. Following studies of marriage, this article takes these myriad ways as forming a continuum of kinship principles and practices that can be foregrounded and backgrounded in different localities and at different times, in ways that both respond to and shape external and internal fa…
Dietary intake and processes of behaviour change in a nutrition education intervention for pregnant women in rural Malawi
Objective: To examine if increased intake of locally available nutrient-dense foods among pregnant women improved the quality of their dietary intake and if use of the Theory of Planned Behaviour could explain changes in their dietary behaviour. Design: We used data from a randomised controlled trial where the intervention group received nutrition education and dietary counselling. We promoted the use of recipes that utilised powders to enhance d…
Pragmatics of everyday life
Many abortions are performed annually in the People's Republic of China, where the practice is legal, largely safe, and readily available. In this article we present a qualitative study exploring the experiences and perceptions of sixteen Tibetan women who had undergone induced abortions, and five healthcare workers from hospitals in Lhasa in which abortions are carried out. Our findings in this first study of abortion in the Tibet Autonomous Reg…
In search of trust and efficacy
This article describes how Tibetan medicine, traditionally an ethnomedicine indigenous to Tibetan areas, travels across cultural boundaries in a multiethnic region, presenting empirical findings from Rebgong (Ch. Tongren) in Qinghai province, People's Republic of China. Focusing on Muslim Hui and Han Chinese citizens, we describe how these patients smoothly engage with Tibetan medicine. This, we argue, is enabled by a strong sense of trust in dis…
In search of a face
In the context of increasing access to antiretroviral therapy (ART), the issue of childbearing among people living with HIV is important. The little that is known originates from either studies conducted before widespread availability of highly active ART or has focused on women's or men's reproductive behaviours and experiences. This paper therefore explores factors that influence childbearing decisions of married couples living with HIV in patr…
Women and Gender in Tibetan Medicine
The current issue of 'Asian Medicine' emerges from the presentations made and discussions held during the panel ‘Women and Gender in Medicine and Healing Across Asia’ at the Asian Medicine: Cultivating Traditions and the Challenges of Globalisation conference in Bhutan, September 2009 (organised by IASTAM, the International Association for Traditional Medicine in collaboration with the Institute for Traditional Medicine Services, Thimphu). The or…
Poverty and disabled households in the People’s Republic of China
This article discusses what in international literature has commonly been termed the ‘vicious circle’ of poverty and disability. Our aim is to shed light on recent policies that attempt to break the vicious circle in rural areas in the People’s Republic of China. Drawing on data produced from fieldwork conducted in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, People’s Republic of China, our approach is to explore experiences that households with people …
Disability, poverty and healthcare
This chapter aims to provide an overview of the development of disability policy in the history of the People's Republic of China (PRC). It argues that seen in the perspective of the PRC's political history, the new health reform that was launched in 2002 indicates a significant turn in the party-state's disability policy. This recent phase is characterised by a focus on general welfare services, rather than preferential treatments, and reintrodu…
Litteratur - Kristoffersen, Henning - 2008 Det nye Kina. Oslo
Åpne og lukkede relasjoner
Marte Kjær Galtung
Fra hushold til Hus
Book Notes
Perinatal mortality among pregnant undocumented migrants in Norway 1999-2020
Being undocumented is strongly associated with perinatal mortality in the offspring. Disparities were not explained by maternal origin or maternal health factors, indicating that social determinants of health through delays in receiving adequate care and factors negatively influencing gestational length may be of importance
Chasing dön spirits in Tibetan medical encounters
Although spirit possession is generally considered a psychiatric illness, the class of conditions designated as dön (Tib. gdon, 'afflictive external influences,' often glossed as 'spirit affliction') in Tibetan medicine represents a distinctive paradigm for an etiology where physical and mental facets inhere in every illness. This study draws upon ethnographic fieldwork in eastern Tibet to examine two conditions that represent illness presentatio…
Poverty and disabled households in the People’s Republic of China
This article discusses what in international literature has commonly been termed the ‘vicious circle’ of poverty and disability. Our aim is to shed light on recent policies that attempt to break the vicious circle in rural areas in the People’s Republic of China. Drawing on data produced from fieldwork conducted in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, People’s Republic of China, our approach is to explore experiences that households with people …
Increased risk of adverse maternal pregnancy outcomes among undocumented migrants in Norway
Kinship and the State in Tibet and Its Borderlands
Relations as Potential
Across the Tibetan ethnographic region, not only marriage but kinship more broadly is formed, maintained and explained in heterogeneous and sometimes contradictory ways. Following studies of marriage, this article takes these myriad ways as forming a continuum of kinship principles and practices that can be foregrounded and backgrounded in different localities and at different times, in ways that both respond to and shape external and internal fa…
In search of trust and efficacy
This article describes how Tibetan medicine, traditionally an ethnomedicine indigenous to Tibetan areas, travels across cultural boundaries in a multiethnic region, presenting empirical findings from Rebgong (Ch. Tongren) in Qinghai province, People's Republic of China. Focusing on Muslim Hui and Han Chinese citizens, we describe how these patients smoothly engage with Tibetan medicine. This, we argue, is enabled by a strong sense of trust in dis…
Fra hushold til Hus
Book Notes
Book Notes
Book Notes
Fra hushold til Hus
Litteratur - Kristoffersen, Henning - 2008 Det nye Kina. Oslo
Åpne og lukkede relasjoner
Marte Kjær Galtung
Disability, poverty and healthcare
This chapter aims to provide an overview of the development of disability policy in the history of the People's Republic of China (PRC). It argues that seen in the perspective of the PRC's political history, the new health reform that was launched in 2002 indicates a significant turn in the party-state's disability policy. This recent phase is characterised by a focus on general welfare services, rather than preferential treatments, and reintrodu…
Women and Gender in Tibetan Medicine
The current issue of 'Asian Medicine' emerges from the presentations made and discussions held during the panel ‘Women and Gender in Medicine and Healing Across Asia’ at the Asian Medicine: Cultivating Traditions and the Challenges of Globalisation conference in Bhutan, September 2009 (organised by IASTAM, the International Association for Traditional Medicine in collaboration with the Institute for Traditional Medicine Services, Thimphu). The or…
Poverty and disabled households in the People’s Republic of China
This article discusses what in international literature has commonly been termed the ‘vicious circle’ of poverty and disability. Our aim is to shed light on recent policies that attempt to break the vicious circle in rural areas in the People’s Republic of China. Drawing on data produced from fieldwork conducted in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, People’s Republic of China, our approach is to explore experiences that households with people …
In search of a face
In the context of increasing access to antiretroviral therapy (ART), the issue of childbearing among people living with HIV is important. The little that is known originates from either studies conducted before widespread availability of highly active ART or has focused on women's or men's reproductive behaviours and experiences. This paper therefore explores factors that influence childbearing decisions of married couples living with HIV in patr…
In search of trust and efficacy
This article describes how Tibetan medicine, traditionally an ethnomedicine indigenous to Tibetan areas, travels across cultural boundaries in a multiethnic region, presenting empirical findings from Rebgong (Ch. Tongren) in Qinghai province, People's Republic of China. Focusing on Muslim Hui and Han Chinese citizens, we describe how these patients smoothly engage with Tibetan medicine. This, we argue, is enabled by a strong sense of trust in dis…
Pragmatics of everyday life
Many abortions are performed annually in the People's Republic of China, where the practice is legal, largely safe, and readily available. In this article we present a qualitative study exploring the experiences and perceptions of sixteen Tibetan women who had undergone induced abortions, and five healthcare workers from hospitals in Lhasa in which abortions are carried out. Our findings in this first study of abortion in the Tibet Autonomous Reg…
Dietary intake and processes of behaviour change in a nutrition education intervention for pregnant women in rural Malawi
Objective: To examine if increased intake of locally available nutrient-dense foods among pregnant women improved the quality of their dietary intake and if use of the Theory of Planned Behaviour could explain changes in their dietary behaviour. Design: We used data from a randomised controlled trial where the intervention group received nutrition education and dietary counselling. We promoted the use of recipes that utilised powders to enhance d…
Deservingness
This article brings the social science concept of ‘deservingness’ to bear on clinical cases of transnational migrant patients. Based on the authors’ medical social science research, health delivery practice and clinical work from multiple locations in Africa. Europe and the Americas, the article describes three clinical cases in which assumptions of deservingness have significant implications for the morbidity and mortality of migrant patients. T…
Kinship and the State in Tibet and Its Borderlands
Relations as Potential
Across the Tibetan ethnographic region, not only marriage but kinship more broadly is formed, maintained and explained in heterogeneous and sometimes contradictory ways. Following studies of marriage, this article takes these myriad ways as forming a continuum of kinship principles and practices that can be foregrounded and backgrounded in different localities and at different times, in ways that both respond to and shape external and internal fa…
Food-based nutrition counselling and education intervention for improved diets of pregnant women in rural Malawi
Objective: We wanted to identify factors related to dietary behavioural change among impoverished pregnant women in the face of nutrition education and counselling, describing what creates an enabling environment and barriers for dietary change. Design: We used qualitative data from a cluster-randomised maternal education trial and conducted a thematic analysis using a social ecological framework to describe the factors that influenced dietary ad…
It is the child with the big head’ – Primary healthcare providers’ perceptions of paediatric hydrocephalus in Blantyre, Malawi
Children in Africa are disproportionately burdened by the neurosurgical condition hydrocephalus. In Blantyre, Malawi, paediatric hydrocephalus represents the majority of surgical procedures performed in the neurosurgical department at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital. To reduce morbidity and mortality, timely detection followed by referral from surrounding primary health centres is crucial. Aiming to explore perceptions and identify enablers and …
Chasing dön spirits in Tibetan medical encounters
Although spirit possession is generally considered a psychiatric illness, the class of conditions designated as dön (Tib. gdon, 'afflictive external influences,' often glossed as 'spirit affliction') in Tibetan medicine represents a distinctive paradigm for an etiology where physical and mental facets inhere in every illness. This study draws upon ethnographic fieldwork in eastern Tibet to examine two conditions that represent illness presentatio…
The hidden burden of dysmenorrhea among adolescent girls in Palestine refugee camps
Dysmenorrhea poses significant challenges to the well-being and academic performance of adolescent girls living in Palestine refugee camps. Collaborative efforts and multifaceted approaches are crucial to address dysmenorrhea effectively. This involves research, targeted interventions, culturally sensitive strategies, and fostering a supportive environment that empowers girls to thrive academically and beyond
Perinatal mortality among pregnant undocumented migrants in Norway 1999-2020
Being undocumented is strongly associated with perinatal mortality in the offspring. Disparities were not explained by maternal origin or maternal health factors, indicating that social determinants of health through delays in receiving adequate care and factors negatively influencing gestational length may be of importance
Increased risk of adverse maternal pregnancy outcomes among undocumented migrants in Norway
We use it a lot for everything
Increasing rates of antimicrobial resistance has accelerated global efforts to reduce antibiotic use. While antibiotic resistance poses a significant threat, especially in low-income settings, there is a scarcity of research on how people in such environments, including refugee camps, access and use antibiotics. This article explores factors that contribute to the shaping of antibiotic use in Shatila refugee camp in Lebanon. It is based on six mo…
Tribute to Signe Howell (1942-2025)
Professor Signe Howell passed away on 25 January, leaving a virtually unfillable void at the University of Oslo's Department of Social Anthropology, where she had been working since 1987. She joined us from the University of Edinburgh, coming as a welcome breath of fresh air with her combination of erudition, theoretical sophistication and a remarkable fascination with all things human. The latter trait had followed her since her childhood in the…
Medicine (13 works) · Sociology (11 works) · Political science (8 works) · Environmental health (6 works) · Gender Studies (6 works) · Geography (6 works) · Global Maternal and Child Health (6 works) · Anthropology (5 works) · China (5 works) · Computer Science (5 works)