Participation by conflict-affected and forcibly displaced communities in humanitarian healthcare responses
Citation: Rass E, Lokot M, Brown FL, et al. Participation by conflict-affected and forcibly displaced communities in humanitarian healthcare responses: a systematic review. Journal of Migration and Health. 2020;1-2:100026.
Language: Abstract and full text available in EN.
Free to view: Yes.
Funding sources: UK Research and Innovation Collective Fund Award.
What is this? In order to improve the contextualization of healthcare responses in humanitarian conflict-affected communities, community participation might be used to design and implement actions, particularly among displaced communities in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).
In this systematic review, the authors searched for studies in LMICs that involved healthcare responses for conflicted affected populations and forcibly displaced persons and reported how affected populations were involved in these responses. They restricted their searches to articles published in English before mid-July 2020. They included 18 studies, which were from Angola (1 study), Democratic Republic of Congo (4), Ethiopia (2), Guinea (2), Lebanon (1), Mali (1), Myanmar (1), Pakistan (1), Peru (1), Sierra Leone (2), South Sudan (1) and Tanzania (1).
What was found: At the time of this review, the limited available evidence on humanitarian health responses and community participation suggested that participation at the community level was beneficial for health outcomes and access to and use of healthcare services.
Key barriers and facilitators related to participation included political, economic, socio-cultural, healthcare delivery, health system, and perceptions and beliefs.
Implications: The authors of the review concluded that more comprehensive approaches to encourage community participation should be considered. They also stated that more significant and effective research is needed to help strengthen the implementation of community participation in crisis-affected settings.
Other considerations: The authors of the review discussed their findings in the context of place of residence, ethnicity, culture, language, occupation, gender, sex, religion, education, socioeconomic status, social capital and age.
This summary was prepared by Yasmeen Saeed, checked by Ana Pizarro and Cristián Mansilla, and finalized by Mike Clarke.