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Quality circles or peer review groups, and similar structured small groups of 6–12 health care professionals meet regularly across Europe to reflect on and improve their standard practice. There is debate over their effectiveness in primary health care, especially over their potential to change practitioners’ behaviour. Despite their popularity, we could not identify broad surveys of the literature on quality circles in a primary care context. Our scoping review was intended to identify possible definitions of quality circles, their origins, and reported effectiveness in primary health care, and to identify gaps in our knowledge. We searched appropriate databases and included any relevant paper on quality circles published until December 2017. We then compared information we found in the articles to that we found in books and on websites. Our search returned 7824 citations, from which we identified 82 background papers and 58 papers about quality circles. We found that they originated in manufacturing industry and that many countries adopted them for primary health care to continuously improve medical education, professional development, and quality of care. Quality circles are not standardized and their techniques are complex. We identified 19 papers that described individual studies, one paper that summarized 3 studies, and 1 systematic review that suggested that quality circles can effectively change behaviour, though effect sizes varied, depending on topic and context. Studies also suggested participation may affirm self-esteem and increase professional confidence. Because reports of the effect of quality circles on behaviour are variable, we recommend theory-driven research approaches to analyse and improve the effectiveness of this complex intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This study systematically reviews costing studies of seasonal influenza-like illness (ILI) in high-income countries. Existing reviews on the economic impact of ILI do not report information on drug consumption and its costs, nor do they provide data on the overall cost per episode. Methods: The PRISMA-P checklist was used to design the research protocol. Studies included were cost of illness analysis (COI) and modeling studies that estimated the cost of ILI episodes. Records were searched from January 2000 to December 2016 in electronic bibliographic databases including Medline, Embase, Science Direct, the Cochrane Library, the Centre for Reviews and Disseminations of the University of York, and Google scholar. References from the included studies were hand-searched for completion. Abstract screening, full-text analysis and data extraction were performed by two reviewers independently and discrepancies were resolved by discussion with a third reviewer. A standardized, pre-piloted form was used for data extraction. All costs were converted to 2015 US$ Purchasing Power Parities. Results: The literature search identified 5,104 records. After abstract and title screening, 76 studies were analyzed full-text and 27 studies were finally included in the review. Full estimates of the cost per episode range from US$19 in Korea to US$323 in Germany. Particularly, the cost per episode of laboratory confirmed influenza cases was estimated between US$64 and US$73. Inpatient and outpatient services account for the majority of the costs. Differences in the estimates may reflect country-specific characteristics, as well as other study-specific features including study design, identification strategy of ILI cases, study populations and types of costs included in the analysis. Children usually register higher costs, whereas evidence for the elderly is less conclusive. Patients risk-profile, co-morbidities and complications are the other important cost-drivers. None of the papers considered appropriateness in resource use (e.g. abuse of antibiotics). Despite cost of illness studies have ultimately a descriptive role, evidence on (in)appropriateness is useful for policy-makers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Pneumococcal disease causes substantial morbidity and mortality, including among adults. Adult pneumococcal vaccines help to prevent these burdens, but they are underused. Accounting for the full benefits of adult pneumococcal vaccination may promote more rational resource allocation decisions with respect to adult pneumococcal vaccines. Objectives: Using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, we conducted a systematic review to assess the extent to which the literature has empirically captured (e.g., through measurement or modeling) the full benefits of adult pneumococcal vaccination. Methods: We systematically searched PubMed and Embase to identify studies published between January 1, 2010 and April 10, 2016 that examine adult pneumococcal vaccination. We included articles if they captured any health or economic benefit of an adult pneumococcal vaccine administered to adults age ≥ 50 or ≥ 18 in risk groups. Finally, we summarized the literature by categorizing the types of benefits captured, the perspective taken, and the strength of the evidence presented. Our protocol is number 42016038335 in the PROSPERO International prospective register of systematic reviews. Results: We identified 5,857 papers and included 150 studies for analysis. While most capture health gains and healthcare cost savings, far fewer studies consider additional benefit categories, such as productivity gains. However, the studies with a broader approach still exhibit significant limitations; for example, many present only abstracts, while others offer no new measurements. Studies that examine the 13-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine focus more on broad economic benefits, but still have limitations. Conclusions: This review highlights the need for more robust empirical accounting of the full benefits of adult pneumococcal vaccination. Literature outside this realm indicates that these broad benefits may be substantial. Failing to investigate the full benefits may lead society to undervalue vaccines' contributions and therefore underinvest in their development and adoption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An ecological correlation study of the prevalence of hypertension with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) prevalence in sub-Saharan Africa was conducted to determine the extent to which these conditions coincide at country level. Methods: Data on prevalence of hypertension were derived from a systematic search of literature published between 1975 and 2014 with corresponding national estimates on HIV prevalence and antiretroviral therapy (ART) coverage from the Demographic and Health Surveys and the joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS databases. National estimates on gross national income (GNI) and under-five mortality were obtained from the World Bank database. Linear regression analyses using robust standard errors (allowing for clustering at country level) were carried out for associations of age-standardised hypertension prevalence ratios (standardized to rural Uganda’s hypertension prevalence data) with HIV prevalence, adjusted for national indicators, year of study and sex of the study population. Results: In total, 140 estimates of prevalence of hypertension representing 25 nations were sex-and area-matched with corresponding HIV prevalence. A two-fold increase in HIV prevalence was associated with a 9.29% increase in age, sex and study year-adjusted prevalence ratio for hypertension (95% CI 2.0 to 16.5, p = 0.01), which increased to 16.3% (95% CI 9.3 to 21.1) after adjusting for under-five mortality, GNI per capita and ART coverage. Conclusions: Countries with a pronounced burden of HIV may also have an increased burden of non-communicable diseases such as hypertension with potential economic and health systems implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]