Health Sector Managers

Ineffective district health management potentially impacts on health system performance and service delivery. However, little is known about district health managing practices and time allocation in resource-constrained health systems. Therefore, a time use study was conducted in order to understand current time use practices of district health managers in Ghana. [from abstract]

This article proposes a performance appraisal based on competency models of leadership for a larger professional group working across several different organizations, yet in similar professional and institutional environments. The empirical data in this article are based on two surveys that were conducted in 15 Slovenian public hospitals. [from abstract]

Trending in Nigeria is the conventional view that medical practitioners should look after patients, while administrators look after organizations. Yet several pioneering healthcare institutions have turned this assumption on its head and achieved outstanding performance in the UK and in central Europe. This can be replicated in Nigeria through the adoption of clinical leadership practices and the restructuring of the healthcare system in Nigeria, which has been characterized by strike actions from medical
practioners. [from abstract]

This chapter gives an account of one relatively modest but effective intervention in an orthopaedic outpatient clinic at the New Somerset Hospital (NSH) in Cape Town in 2013. This project aimed to reduce patient waiting times in the clinic, and improve patient satisfaction. [from introduction]

Health and well-being services, in common with many public services, cannot be delivered by a single organisation and require co-ordination across several organisations in a locality. There is some evidence, mostly from other sectors, that middle managers play pivotal roles in this co-ordination by developing networks of relationships with colleagues in other organisations. These networks of relationships, established over time, provide contexts in which managers can, collectively, create the knowledge needed to address the challenges they encounter.

The [National Health Service] is confronted by radically changing demographic pressures and hugely increasing demands. Alongside these is the need to build public confidence after several high-profile scandals, to increase productivity and to promote innovation in health and social care. This all comes as public sector financial cuts are implemented on a large scale. How can health care organisations respond effectively to these challenges? [from introduction]

In countries that have historically suffered from limited resources and entrenched medical systems – including Egypt, Afghanistan, and Tanzania – or ganizational learning approaches have enabled frontline health managers and their teams to achieve measurable improvements in critical areas such as family planning, HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention, children’s health, and maternal mortality. [from introduction]

This study aims to investigate how NHS middle managers encounter, adapt and apply management knowledge in their working practices and to examine the factors [particularly organisational context, career background and networks of practice (NoPs)/communities of practice (CoPs)] which may facilitate or impede the acceptance of new management knowledge and its integration with practice in health-care settings. [from abstract]

This study focuses on how health and well-being managers collectively create knowledge. [from introduction]

To address the degree of burnout in nursing managers in hospitals of Western Switzerland, including comparison with medical managers, and its relationship with personal, work-related, and organizational characteristics. [from abstract]

This project addressed three questions: how middle management roles in acute care settings changing, and the implications of these developments; how changes are managed following serious incidents; and how clinical and organisational outcomes are influenced by management practice and the properties an enabling environment should possess to support those contributions. [adapted from abstract]

Supervision plays a key role in performance and motivation, but is frequently characterized by periodic inspection and control, rather than support and feedback to improve performance. This paper explores the perceptions of district health management teams in Tanzania and Malawi on their role as supervisors and on the challenges to effective supervision at the district level. [from abstract]

This manual presents the basic components of a human resources for health system, and explains why and how they have to work in synergy to contribute to the achievement of the health sector strategic goals. [from publisher]

This guide is for health policy makers, program managers, operations researchers or other health professionals who want to bring about change in a health practice or set of practices at a national, regional or facility level. [adapted from author]

This toolkit provides evidence-based guidance and tools to update, expand, or develop leadership and management skills in health managers and service provision programs. [from publisher]

This article has been written as a guide for program managers who want to recognize and support high quality cost-effetiveness analysis (CEA) of training. It focuses on the approaches and challenges associated with conducting CEA of training in the context of program implementation or rapid expansion of programs. [from author]

At the middle-management level, leaders are often selected for their clinical expertise and not their management skills. The purpose of this study was to examine how leaders at the middle-management level work with people in health-care. [adapted from abstract]

This study examines the performance of district health managers in high and low performing districts in an attempt to understand whether, and the extent to which, they affect the performance of their district health services. [from author]

This study aimed to determine the general managerial and public health competencies that are essential for primary health care clinic managers in South Africa. [from author]

This review examined literature on the roles of mid-level managers to understand how they might influence service delivery quality in Kenyan hospitals. [adapted from abstract]

This strategic plan is intended to provide directions for countries to develop comprehensive interventions to strengthen the management of health systems and health sector managers in a coherent and systematic manner. [adapted from author]

The aim of this study is to explore clinicians’ journeys towards management positions in hospitals, in order to identify potential drivers and barriers to management recruitment and development. [from abstract]

This case study explores the development and impact of a training program to improve health sector management and leadership so that the ministry of health could become more efficient and provide the quality of services that the Egyptian population needed and demanded. [adapted from author]

This study investigated the reasons for the poor performance of the district health executives reported by provincial health managers in the Midlands province of Zimbabwe. [adapted from abstract]

The authors present the protocol of an evaluation of a district-level capacity-building intervention to identify the determinants of performance of health workers in managerial positions and to understand how changes (if any) are brought about. The scope for applying realist evaluation to study human resource management interventions in health is also discussed. [from abstract]

This resource is designed to assist health managers at all levels of an organization face challenges such as: how to create a shared vision of better health and a clear plan for achieving it; improving work climate; preparing for higher levels of responsibility; and leading change inside and outside the organization. [adapted from publisher]

The objective of this study was to pilot an action learning group program, (an informal, practically based management training program which allow trainees to reflect on their own work environment) with managers in a rural public health setting and to explore participants’ experience of the program. [adapted from abstract]

The aims of this policy include: ensuring the appointment of competent and skilled hospital managers; providing for the development of management accountability frameworks; and ensuring the training of managers in leadership, management and governance. [adapated from author]

The aim of this study is to provide a mechanism for decision makers in health services planning and management to compare a broad range of modelling and simulation methods so that they can better select and use them or better commission relevant modelling and simulation work that can assist in the process of designing health care policies, strategies and operations. [from abstract]

The quality of health services is influenced by the technical and managerial skills of the hospital team. This training curriculum aims to improve the management skills of the hospital teams by focusing on behavioral change and institutionalizing of the culture of quality improvement. [from foreword]