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 Active work groups:Health ServicesPart of measuring how well a health system is functioning requires knowing both how many of the individuals in need of a health intervention actually receive it and the quality of the intervention delivered. Traditionally, work in the area of health system delivery has focused solely on crude coverage – the proportion of individuals who need an intervention that received it. This ignores the fact that the quality of the intervention received may be very different across individuals or populations. Common areas for which coverage has been measured include immunization, skilled birth attendance, and antenatal care. In contrast, effective coverage provides a more comprehensive health service metric that embeds the notion of quality alongside delivery. IHME has developed a systematic approach to identifying the priority interventions in different world regions, developing measurement strategies for these interventions, and compiling publicly available datasets. While we strive to measure effective coverage for as many interventions as possible and in as many settings as possible, we recognize that given both the availability of data and the timeframe for developing the necessary techniques, we must be selective in focus. As a first step, we have begun assessing effective coverage of a targeted set of interventions and are improving available methods to assess crude coverage with available indicators to advance research where effective coverage cannot be measured from existing data. The specific interventions we are currently working on include skilled birth attendance; a range of childhood vaccines, such as measles and hepatitis B; bed nets for malaria; blood pressure-, glucose-, and cholesterol-lowering medication. For more information, please contact: healthservices@healthmetricsandevaluation.org |
