Alison Swartz
Datos Biográficos
| ID | 97857 |
|---|---|
| NOMBRE | Alison Swartz |
| NOMBRES | Alison |
| APELLIDO | Swartz |
| FIRMA | SWARTZ A |
| AFILIACIONES | University of Cape Town |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4021-9838 |
| VERIFICADO | Sí |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 27 |
| TOTAL DE CITAS | 33 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 27 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMER AÑO DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2013 |
| AÑO MÁS RECIENTE DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 4 |
(Un)sweetened deal? Young people’s views on the South African Health Promotion Levy and food in Khayelitsha, Cape Town
On 1 April 2018 the South African Health Promotion Levy on sugary beverages (HPL) came into effect with the goal of lowering the consumption of sugar sweetened beverages (SSBs) across the South African population. The Republic of South Africa, following the economic and nutrition transitions that occurred after the end of Apartheid, has one of the highest rates of obesity in sub-Saharan Africa. Within this context, this qualitative study examined…
Integrating recommendations for transgender and gender non-conforming perinatal care in the NHS
Transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) people are utilising National Health Service (NHS) perinatal care services with increasing frequency. Despite this, many healthcare institutions do not have policy, education, or resources in place to provide appropriate care. Research on the experience of TGNC pregnancy service users is limited within an NHS context. This study employed a qualitative approach to explore NHS midwives’ views of the acce…
“Getting involved”
South Africa has the world's highest HIV burden. Assisted partner notification (APN) has been shown to improve HIV testing uptake and case finding, yet little is known about its implementation in contexts where gender inequalities, stigma and complex relationship dynamics shape disclosure. This qualitative study explored implementation experiences of APN services among healthcare providers and patients in Cape Town. Between March 2021 and Februar…
Your pain and mine
As someone with lived experience of SCD who has held roles as a researcher and an advocate, this study has made me more driven to put patient voices within published literature because service provision, in any setting, which is not informed by patient experiences, will continue to miss the needs of the users
Peer support groups as a participatory development principle
This paper reimagines peer support groups by centring a community’s worldviews. We engage with Iliso Lamakhosikazi, a women’s peer support group in South Africa, through an eight-week qualitative study embedded within nearly a decade of collaborative research. This study, using participatory observations, interviews, and focus groups, reveals how Iliso Lamakhosikazi reimagines peer support groups in terms of sociality, focus, and operational stru…
Applying GRADE-Cerqual to Interpretive Review Findings
GRADE-CERQual (Confidence in the Evidence from Reviews of Qualitative research) was developed to support the use of evidence from qualitative reviews within policy- and decision-making. To date, the approach has been applied predominantly to aggregative synthesis methodologies and descriptive review findings. GRADE-CERQual guidance recommends the approach be tested on more diverse review methodologies and outputs to support its evolution. This pa…
Innovate! Accelerate! Evaluate! Harnessing the RE-AIM framework to examine the global dissemination of parenting resources during Covid-19 to more than 210 million people
This study highlights the importance of a) establishing an international collaboration to rapidly adapt and disseminate evidence-based content into easily accessible resources that are relevant to the needs of parents; b) creating open-source and agile delivery models that are responsive to local contexts and receptive to further adaptation; and c) using the best methods available to evaluate a rapidly deployed global emergency response in real-t…
Cyclical Engagement in HIV Care
Contraceptive trajectories postpartum
“An Unchanging God in a Changing World”
Embodiment, agency, unmet need
Globally, high rates of unintended pregnancy occur despite widespread distribution of modern contraceptive methods, reflecting the complexity of individual contraceptive use. The concept of unmet need provides a framework for addressing the gap between women's desire to prevent pregnancy and the ability of health services to meet women's contraceptive needs. Through in-depth interviews in Khayelitsha, South Africa, we examine 14 young women's exp…
Organisational Culture and Mask-Wearing Practices for Tuberculosis Infection Prevention and Control among Health Care Workers in Primary Care Facilities in the Western Cape, South Africa
Background : Although many healthcare workers (HCWs) are aware of the protective role that mask-wearing has in reducing transmission of tuberculosis (TB) and other airborne diseases, studies on infection prevention and control (IPC) for TB in South Africa indicate that mask-wearing is often poorly implemented. Mask-wearing practices are influenced by aspects of the environment and organisational culture within which HCWs work. Methods : We draw o…
Exploring condom use decision-making among adolescents
The study highlighted the role of affective states as part of the process of examining alternatives when deciding to use a condom or not. Interventions to strengthen condom use decision-making should therefore incorporate not only rational but also affective processes to improve adolescent sexual and reproductive outcomes
The Money, It’s OK but It’s not OK”
Fostering a healthy public for men and HIV
This paper examines the recently formed Movement for Change and Social Justice (MCSJ) in the township of Gugulethu, in Cape Town, South Africa. MCSJ is a health and social justice movement that has an unusual trajectory—guided by the political principles and strategies of South Africa AIDS activism, inspired but also frustrated by the contemporary progressive public health activism, and catalysed by a university research partnership at the Univer…
It has become everybody’s business and nobody’s business’
South Africa is increasingly offering screening, diagnosis and treatment of tuberculosis (TB), and especially drug-resistant TB, at the primary care level. Nosocomial transmission of TB within primary health facilities is a growing concern in South Africa, and globally. We explore here how TB infection prevention and control (IPC) policies, historically focused on hospitals, are being implemented within primary care facilities. We spoke to 15 pol…
What will it really take to end the HIV epidemic
International audience
Toxic layering through three disciplinary lenses
This article focuses on the devastating hidden perils of agricultural pesticides repurposed by informal sellers in urban South African townships to kill rats and other unwanted pests. Drawing on collaborative research techniques, we investigate the causal relationship between child poisoning episodes and the household use of illegal street pesticides. Such pesticides are used to safeguard homes from pests in an attempt to protect children from th…
The problem or the solution? Early fertility and parenthood in the transition to adulthood in Khayelitsha, South Africa
In South Africa, early fertility and teenage pregnancy have become a central focus of both political and public health concern. In this article, we explore the ways that young men and women have used their fertility and performance of parenthood to navigate the transition from childhood to adulthood. For these young people, the persistent inequities related to income poverty, inadequate education, lack of employment opportunities and a high burde…
Self-management of medical abortion
Medical abortion is a method of pregnancy termination that by its nature enables more active involvement of women in the process of managing, and sometimes even administering the medications for, their abortions. This qualitative evidence synthesis reviewed the global evidence on experiences with, preferences for, and concerns about greater self-management of medical abortion with lesser health professional involvement. We focused on qualitative …
The Cape Town boyfriend and the Joburg boyfriend
In South Africa, young people's "multiple" or "concurrent" partnerships have been increasingly prominent in public health discourses - as drivers of HIV transmission. Multiple partnerships are typically framed in moralising, negative terms and depicted primarily as male-driven, within a broader framework of women's vulnerability and use of sex for survival and material gain. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with adolescents and young adults in Kha…
Extension agents or agents of change
Global public health discourse and practice around community health workers (CHWs) often invoke two distinct ideal types: the CHW as an "extension agent" of biomedical health services, bringing health services into community and household settings, and the CHW as a progressive "agent of change," working with communities to mobilize socially and politically around health inequities and identify and tackle the social determinants of health. In this…
It’s in our veins’
Khayelitsha, an economically marginal peri-urban settlement in Cape Town, is home to a number of 'flagship' public health interventions aimed at HIV/AIDS and TB. Alongside these high-profile, foreign donor-driven treatment and care programmes are a plethora of NGOs that provide a wide range of community-based carework. Some of these organisations are large, well funded and well connected globally, while others are run by a few unemployed women re…
It’s in Our Veins”
Khayelitsha, an economically marginal peri-urban settlement in Cape Town, is home to a number of 'flagship' public health interventions aimed at HIV/AIDS and TB. Alongside these high-profile, foreign donor-driven treatment and care programmes are a plethora of NGOs that provide a wide range of community-based carework. Some of these organisations are large, well-funded and wellconnected globally, while others are run by a few unemployed women res…
Theorising beyond the individual
Adherence to antiretroviral therapy, while often conceptualised as an individual or community-level concern, needs to be understood in the context of political and historical developments that have characterised many resource-constrained societies. This article identifies some of these dimensions of antiretroviral therapy adherence in South Africa and outlines the implications for community health psychology in taking this perspective. Using the …
Theorising beyond the individual
Adherence to antiretroviral therapy, while often conceptualised as an individual or community-level concern, needs to be understood in the context of political and historical developments that have characterised many resource-constrained societies. This article identifies some of these dimensions of antiretroviral therapy adherence in South Africa and outlines the implications for community health psychology in taking this perspective. Using the …
Legacy, Legitimacy, and Possibility
In South Africa, the response to HIV and TB epidemics is complex, varied, and contextually defined. "Task-shifting" and a movement toward a decentralized model of care have led to an increased reliance on community health workers (CHWs) providing health care services to residents of impoverished, peri-urban areas. Public health policy tends to present CHWs as a homogeneous group, with little attention paid to the nuances of experience, motivation…
Self-management of medical abortion
Medical abortion is a method of pregnancy termination that by its nature enables more active involvement of women in the process of managing, and sometimes even administering the medications for, their abortions. This qualitative evidence synthesis reviewed the global evidence on experiences with, preferences for, and concerns about greater self-management of medical abortion with lesser health professional involvement. We focused on qualitative …
Extension agents or agents of change
Global public health discourse and practice around community health workers (CHWs) often invoke two distinct ideal types: the CHW as an "extension agent" of biomedical health services, bringing health services into community and household settings, and the CHW as a progressive "agent of change," working with communities to mobilize socially and politically around health inequities and identify and tackle the social determinants of health. In this…
Contraceptive trajectories postpartum
The problem or the solution? Early fertility and parenthood in the transition to adulthood in Khayelitsha, South Africa
In South Africa, early fertility and teenage pregnancy have become a central focus of both political and public health concern. In this article, we explore the ways that young men and women have used their fertility and performance of parenthood to navigate the transition from childhood to adulthood. For these young people, the persistent inequities related to income poverty, inadequate education, lack of employment opportunities and a high burde…
Toxic layering through three disciplinary lenses
This article focuses on the devastating hidden perils of agricultural pesticides repurposed by informal sellers in urban South African townships to kill rats and other unwanted pests. Drawing on collaborative research techniques, we investigate the causal relationship between child poisoning episodes and the household use of illegal street pesticides. Such pesticides are used to safeguard homes from pests in an attempt to protect children from th…
The Cape Town boyfriend and the Joburg boyfriend
In South Africa, young people's "multiple" or "concurrent" partnerships have been increasingly prominent in public health discourses - as drivers of HIV transmission. Multiple partnerships are typically framed in moralising, negative terms and depicted primarily as male-driven, within a broader framework of women's vulnerability and use of sex for survival and material gain. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with adolescents and young adults in Kha…
Understanding careseeking for child illness in sub-Saharan Africa
Legacy, Legitimacy, and Possibility
In South Africa, the response to HIV and TB epidemics is complex, varied, and contextually defined. "Task-shifting" and a movement toward a decentralized model of care have led to an increased reliance on community health workers (CHWs) providing health care services to residents of impoverished, peri-urban areas. Public health policy tends to present CHWs as a homogeneous group, with little attention paid to the nuances of experience, motivation…
It’s in our veins’
Khayelitsha, an economically marginal peri-urban settlement in Cape Town, is home to a number of 'flagship' public health interventions aimed at HIV/AIDS and TB. Alongside these high-profile, foreign donor-driven treatment and care programmes are a plethora of NGOs that provide a wide range of community-based carework. Some of these organisations are large, well funded and well connected globally, while others are run by a few unemployed women re…
It’s in Our Veins”
Khayelitsha, an economically marginal peri-urban settlement in Cape Town, is home to a number of 'flagship' public health interventions aimed at HIV/AIDS and TB. Alongside these high-profile, foreign donor-driven treatment and care programmes are a plethora of NGOs that provide a wide range of community-based carework. Some of these organisations are large, well-funded and wellconnected globally, while others are run by a few unemployed women res…
Theorising beyond the individual
Adherence to antiretroviral therapy, while often conceptualised as an individual or community-level concern, needs to be understood in the context of political and historical developments that have characterised many resource-constrained societies. This article identifies some of these dimensions of antiretroviral therapy adherence in South Africa and outlines the implications for community health psychology in taking this perspective. Using the …
Extension agents or agents of change
Global public health discourse and practice around community health workers (CHWs) often invoke two distinct ideal types: the CHW as an "extension agent" of biomedical health services, bringing health services into community and household settings, and the CHW as a progressive "agent of change," working with communities to mobilize socially and politically around health inequities and identify and tackle the social determinants of health. In this…
Self-management of medical abortion
Medical abortion is a method of pregnancy termination that by its nature enables more active involvement of women in the process of managing, and sometimes even administering the medications for, their abortions. This qualitative evidence synthesis reviewed the global evidence on experiences with, preferences for, and concerns about greater self-management of medical abortion with lesser health professional involvement. We focused on qualitative …
The Cape Town boyfriend and the Joburg boyfriend
In South Africa, young people's "multiple" or "concurrent" partnerships have been increasingly prominent in public health discourses - as drivers of HIV transmission. Multiple partnerships are typically framed in moralising, negative terms and depicted primarily as male-driven, within a broader framework of women's vulnerability and use of sex for survival and material gain. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with adolescents and young adults in Kha…
What will it really take to end the HIV epidemic
International audience
Toxic layering through three disciplinary lenses
This article focuses on the devastating hidden perils of agricultural pesticides repurposed by informal sellers in urban South African townships to kill rats and other unwanted pests. Drawing on collaborative research techniques, we investigate the causal relationship between child poisoning episodes and the household use of illegal street pesticides. Such pesticides are used to safeguard homes from pests in an attempt to protect children from th…
The problem or the solution? Early fertility and parenthood in the transition to adulthood in Khayelitsha, South Africa
In South Africa, early fertility and teenage pregnancy have become a central focus of both political and public health concern. In this article, we explore the ways that young men and women have used their fertility and performance of parenthood to navigate the transition from childhood to adulthood. For these young people, the persistent inequities related to income poverty, inadequate education, lack of employment opportunities and a high burde…
Fostering a healthy public for men and HIV
This paper examines the recently formed Movement for Change and Social Justice (MCSJ) in the township of Gugulethu, in Cape Town, South Africa. MCSJ is a health and social justice movement that has an unusual trajectory—guided by the political principles and strategies of South Africa AIDS activism, inspired but also frustrated by the contemporary progressive public health activism, and catalysed by a university research partnership at the Univer…
It has become everybody’s business and nobody’s business’
South Africa is increasingly offering screening, diagnosis and treatment of tuberculosis (TB), and especially drug-resistant TB, at the primary care level. Nosocomial transmission of TB within primary health facilities is a growing concern in South Africa, and globally. We explore here how TB infection prevention and control (IPC) policies, historically focused on hospitals, are being implemented within primary care facilities. We spoke to 15 pol…
“An Unchanging God in a Changing World”
Embodiment, agency, unmet need
Globally, high rates of unintended pregnancy occur despite widespread distribution of modern contraceptive methods, reflecting the complexity of individual contraceptive use. The concept of unmet need provides a framework for addressing the gap between women's desire to prevent pregnancy and the ability of health services to meet women's contraceptive needs. Through in-depth interviews in Khayelitsha, South Africa, we examine 14 young women's exp…
Organisational Culture and Mask-Wearing Practices for Tuberculosis Infection Prevention and Control among Health Care Workers in Primary Care Facilities in the Western Cape, South Africa
Background : Although many healthcare workers (HCWs) are aware of the protective role that mask-wearing has in reducing transmission of tuberculosis (TB) and other airborne diseases, studies on infection prevention and control (IPC) for TB in South Africa indicate that mask-wearing is often poorly implemented. Mask-wearing practices are influenced by aspects of the environment and organisational culture within which HCWs work. Methods : We draw o…
Exploring condom use decision-making among adolescents
The study highlighted the role of affective states as part of the process of examining alternatives when deciding to use a condom or not. Interventions to strengthen condom use decision-making should therefore incorporate not only rational but also affective processes to improve adolescent sexual and reproductive outcomes
The Money, It’s OK but It’s not OK”
Cyclical Engagement in HIV Care
Contraceptive trajectories postpartum
Applying GRADE-Cerqual to Interpretive Review Findings
GRADE-CERQual (Confidence in the Evidence from Reviews of Qualitative research) was developed to support the use of evidence from qualitative reviews within policy- and decision-making. To date, the approach has been applied predominantly to aggregative synthesis methodologies and descriptive review findings. GRADE-CERQual guidance recommends the approach be tested on more diverse review methodologies and outputs to support its evolution. This pa…
Innovate! Accelerate! Evaluate! Harnessing the RE-AIM framework to examine the global dissemination of parenting resources during Covid-19 to more than 210 million people
This study highlights the importance of a) establishing an international collaboration to rapidly adapt and disseminate evidence-based content into easily accessible resources that are relevant to the needs of parents; b) creating open-source and agile delivery models that are responsive to local contexts and receptive to further adaptation; and c) using the best methods available to evaluate a rapidly deployed global emergency response in real-t…
Your pain and mine
As someone with lived experience of SCD who has held roles as a researcher and an advocate, this study has made me more driven to put patient voices within published literature because service provision, in any setting, which is not informed by patient experiences, will continue to miss the needs of the users
Peer support groups as a participatory development principle
This paper reimagines peer support groups by centring a community’s worldviews. We engage with Iliso Lamakhosikazi, a women’s peer support group in South Africa, through an eight-week qualitative study embedded within nearly a decade of collaborative research. This study, using participatory observations, interviews, and focus groups, reveals how Iliso Lamakhosikazi reimagines peer support groups in terms of sociality, focus, and operational stru…
(Un)sweetened deal? Young people’s views on the South African Health Promotion Levy and food in Khayelitsha, Cape Town
On 1 April 2018 the South African Health Promotion Levy on sugary beverages (HPL) came into effect with the goal of lowering the consumption of sugar sweetened beverages (SSBs) across the South African population. The Republic of South Africa, following the economic and nutrition transitions that occurred after the end of Apartheid, has one of the highest rates of obesity in sub-Saharan Africa. Within this context, this qualitative study examined…
Medicine (19 obras) · Sociology (16 obras) · Nursing (13 obras) · Political science (13 obras) · HIV/AIDS Research and Interventions (12 obras) · Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health (10 obras) · Public health (10 obras) · Qualitative research (10 obras) · Psychology (9 obras) · Business (8 obras)