Busse Heidi, Aboneh Ephrem A, Tefera Girma
Global Health. 2014 Sep 5;10:64. doi: 10.1186/s12992-014-0064-x.
The positive impact of global health activities by volunteers from the United States in low-and middle-income countries has been recognized. Most existing global health partnerships evaluate what knowledge, ideas, and activities the US institution transferred to the low- or middle-income country. However, what this fails to capture are what kinds of change happen to US-based partners due to engagement in global health partnerships, both at the individual and institutional levels. "Reverse innovation" is the term that is used in global health literature to describe this type of impact. The objectives of this study were to identify what kinds of impact global partnerships have on health volunteers from developed countries, advance this emerging body of knowledge, and improve understanding of methods and indicators for assessing reverse innovation.
The study population consisted of 80 US, Canada, and South Africa-based health care professionals who volunteered at Tikur Anbessa Specialized Hospital in Ethiopia. Surveys were web-based and included multiple choice and open-ended questions to assess global health competencies. The data were analyzed using IBRM SPSS® version 21 for quantitative analysis; the open-ended responses were coded using constant comparative analysis to identify themes.
Of the 80 volunteers, 63 responded (79 percent response rate). Fifty-two percent of the respondents were male, and over 60 percent were 40 years of age and older. Eighty-three percent reported they accomplished their trip objectives, 95 percent would participate in future activities and 96 percent would recommend participation to other colleagues. Eighty-nine percent reported personal impact and 73 percent reported change on their professional development. Previous global health experience, multiple prior trips, and the desire for career advancement were associated with positive impact on professional development.
Professionally and personally meaningful learning happens often during global health outreach. Understanding this impact has important policy, economic, and programmatic implications. With the aid of improved monitoring and evaluation frameworks, the simple act of attempting to measure "reverse innovation" may represent a shift in how global health partnerships are perceived, drawing attention to the two-way learning and benefits that occur and improving effectiveness in global health partnership spending.
来自美国的志愿者在低收入和中等收入国家开展的全球健康活动所产生的积极影响已得到认可。大多数现有的全球健康伙伴关系评估的是美国机构向低收入或中等收入国家转移了哪些知识、理念和活动。然而，这未能捕捉到的是，由于参与全球健康伙伴关系，美国伙伴在个人和机构层面发生了哪些变化。“逆向创新”是全球健康文献中用于描述这种影响类型的术语。本研究的目的是确定全球伙伴关系对来自发达国家的健康志愿者产生了哪些影响，推进这一新兴知识体系，并增进对评估逆向创新的方法和指标的理解。
研究对象包括80名来自美国、加拿大和南非的医疗保健专业人员，他们在埃塞俄比亚的提库尔·安贝萨专科医院做志愿者。调查采用网络形式，包括多项选择题和开放式问题，以评估全球健康能力。使用IBRM SPSS® 21版对数据进行定量分析；对开放式回答采用持续比较分析进行编码以确定主题。
80名志愿者中有63人回复（回复率为79%）。52%的受访者为男性，超过60%的受访者年龄在40岁及以上。83%的人表示他们实现了出行目标，95%的人愿意参加未来的活动，96%的人会向其他同事推荐参与。89%的人报告有个人影响，73%的人报告对其职业发展有改变。以前的全球健康经验、多次先前出行以及职业晋升愿望与对职业发展的积极影响相关。
在全球健康推广活动中，经常会发生具有职业和个人意义的学习。理解这种影响具有重要的政策、经济和项目意义。借助改进的监测和评估框架，尝试衡量“逆向创新”这一简单行为可能代表了对全球健康伙伴关系认知方式的转变，将注意力引向发生的双向学习和益处，并提高全球健康伙伴关系支出的有效性。
