As an accredited annual journal of research on health policy development, reform, implementation and intervention for systemic improvement, the South African Health Review (SAHR) represents and expresses Health Systems Trust’s vision of building health for all in our country through strengthened health systems.
Generated in the context of partnership with policy-makers, planners, health managers, researchers, and health and development organisations – both locally and abroad – who constitute the sources and the audience of the Review’s content, the knowledge encapsulated in this publication enlightens regional and international thought and action around people-centred health care.
Flanked by the standard chapters on health policy and legislation and on health and related indicators, this 18th edition of the SAHR presents material that reflects the wide scope of important topics in the contemporary terrain of health systems strengthening. The issues covered range from the specificity of needs-based rural health resource allocation, a call to integrate disability in equitable care, and the structure of medical schemes’ benefit options, to understandings of roles, participation, knowledge and implementation within the realm of public mental health services as well as the nursing profession. There are also incisive texts on key aspects of health management, such as the nature and use of information for decision-making at facility level, leadership development among frontline managers, and capacitating community participation in primary health care.
On behalf of the Board, I commend the host of dedicated professionals whose commitment and expertise have borne fruit in this enterprise: the accomplished authors whose data and analytical perspectives form the grist of this edition’s content; the eminent academics who served as peer reviewers; the members of the SAHR Editorial Advisory Committee for their invaluable guidance through selection and refinement processes; and HST’s diligent editorial team and administrative staff.
We are perennially grateful to the National Department of Health for supporting the production of the Review, thus enabling a sustained contribution to the realisation of a healthy life for all.