The Impact of TEEAL on the usage of AGORA in Academic and Research Institutions in Uganda

The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) and the Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA) are key information support programs in learning, teaching, and research. They provide access to relevant scientific evidence, in agriculture and related sciences. While AGORA was introduced in Uganda in 2005, TEEAL was introduced earlier as a “Library in a Box” and later as LAN-TEEAL. With the recent increase in acquisition of TEEAL sets at a number of academic and research institutions in Uganda and with the TEEAL and AGORA campaigns through the training organized under the Information Training and Outreach Center for Africa (ITOCA), it is not clear how TEEAL has impacted on Agricultural research and on the usage of AGORA as an online program in Uganda. The aim of his paper was to explore how TEEAL is used compared to its counterpart, AGORA. The key question to this study relates to respondents’ preference among the two programs and the underlying reasons. An online questionnaire was used to gather responses regarding preference and use of the two programs by students, academics, librarians, IT specialists, and researchers at the various institutions in Uganda. The study was informed by a review of literature from related studies. Findings from 59 respondents indicate that all (100%) the respondents had an idea of TEEAL while for AGORA it was 58 (98.3%) respondents. Of the respondents, 52.5% preferred TEEAL to AGORA because it required no internet access, although the majority believed that AGORA was more important than TEEAL, due to the coverage of more relevant online scientific literature. The most prominent challenges to TEEAL and AGORA were network failures and slow internet, respectively. TEEAL and AGORA were both acknowledged to be very vital resources for academic and research institutions in Uganda. TEEAL mainly had one advantage over AGORA and that is being an offline resource that can be used in institutions with unreliable and inadequate internet. AGORA was also found to have an advantage over TEEAL in that it had a wider content coverage. The most common strategy for improving the use of both programs, as stated by the respondents, was increasing awareness through training and marketing. It was thus recommended that the program hosts utilize the results of this study to improve the utilization of these vital agricultural databases through further training and awareness. It was also recommended that institutions be advised to strengthen their IT infrastructure to support the programs and ensure effective use, for increasing their academic and research output

Nursing and Midwifery Research Output in Africa: A Review of the Literature

Background: Nurses and midwives form the backbone of health service delivery and satisfaction with care often depends on the competencies of nurses and midwives who provide the care (World Health Organization [WHO], 2002). Healthcare has become complex, challenging, and demanding across diverse sociocultural and socioeconomic changes and environments. To optimize their impact, nurses and midwives therefore need to be prepared with evidence-based competences. Nursing research therefore, is the cornerstone for evidence-based practice and for establishing the professional status of nursing and building research capacity. However, although nursing research began in the 19th century, it is limited in Africa, with little evidence generated to inform policy and practice. Although nursing and midwifery education in the region has advanced with graduate and postgraduate level education, little is known about nursing and midwifery research conducted in universities and where to find such research. Objectives: The literature review aimed at quantifying and identifying the types and gaps in nursing and midwives’ research and publications in Africa. Methods: Articles published between January 1, 2007 and January 31, 2017 were retrieved from PubMed and Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) with a search strategy that employed four sets of terms: (a) terms identifying published research done by nurses or midwives, or both; (b) terms identifying types of publications; (c) terms identifying filters for African countries; and (d) filters for publication dates. We also searched Google Scholar to capture nonindexed sources. Results and Conclusions: There is evidence of an increasing number of African nurses and midwives publishing research; however, much of this research may not be readily available. The promotion of nursing research and capacity building/mentorship in research for nurses and midwives is recommended to increase nurses’ and midwives’ skills to critically evaluate research and apply the best evidence to their practice

Building the Capacity of African Health Sciences Librarians in the Development and Conduct of Systematic Reviews: The Initiative of African Medical Librarians

While African health sciences librarians’ role as expert searchers is widely recognized, they have much more to contribute to supporting the development and conduct of systematic reviews. Research evidence has indicated that the librarians rarely participate in the development and conduct of systematic reviews because they are either not called upon to be part, or do not have the skills to participate. Moreover, few librarians who have participated are from outside Africa. Keeping this in mind, the Network of African Medical Librarians (NAML) conducted a pre-AHILA Conference training workshop to introduce participants, specifically the librarians, to the systematic review process. The regional conference for health librarians took place in Ibadan, Nigeria from 14-18 October 2019. This paper evaluates the impact of training of African health sciences librarians in the conduct of systematic reviews. Participants' evaluation feedback was collected using pre and post-training surveys. A mixed-method was employed to gather and analyze both quantitative and qualitative data. The results indicated that the main barriers to librarians’ participation in systematic reviews were lack of skills due to insufficient training and lack of time. This paper is expected to encourage the librarians to advocate for further skills development, in addition to their normal information searching roles. Their participation in the systematic review process would make them, not just relevant but dependable collaborators of systematic review teams, as they participate in improving systematic review reporting

Barriers and Facilitators to the Integration of Mental Health Services into Primary Health Care: A Systematic Review Protocol.

Background Mental health is an integral part of health and well-being and yet health systems have not adequately responded to the burden of mental disorders. Integrating mental health services into primary health care (PHC) is the most viable way of closing the treatment gap and ensuring that people get the mental health care they need. PHC was formally adapted by the World Health Organization (WHO), and they have since invested enormous amounts of resources across the globe to ensure that integration of mental health services into PHC works. Methods This review will use the SPIDER (Sample, Phenomenon of Interest, Design, Evaluation, Research type) framework approach to identify experiences of mental health integration into PHC; the findings will be reported using the “Best fit” framework synthesis. PubMed, EMBASE, PsycINFO, and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled trials (CENTRAL) will be searched including other sources like the WHO website and OpenGrey database. Assessment of bias and quality will be done at study level using two separate tools to check for the quality of evidence presented. Data synthesis will take on two synergistic approaches (qualitative and quantitative studies). Synthesizing evidence from countries across the globe will provide useful insights into the experiences of integrating mental health services into PHC and how the barriers and challenges have been handled. The findings will be useful to a wide array of stakeholders involved in the implementation of the mental health integration into PHC. Discussion The SPIDER framework has been chosen for this review because of its suitable application to qualitative and mixed methods research and will be used as a guide when selecting articles for inclusion. Data extracted will be synthesized using the “Best fit” framework because it has been used before and proved its suitability in producing new conceptual models for explaining decision-making and possible behaviors. Synthesizing evidence from countries across the globe will provide useful insights into the experiences of integrating mental health services into PHC and how the barriers and challenges have been handled. Systematic review registration PROSPERO CRD4201605200

Risk Factors for Hemorrhagic and Ischemic Stroke in Sub-Saharan Africa

Introduction. In sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), there is a signifcant burden of ischemic stroke (IS) and hemorrhagic stroke (HS), although data on risk factors for each type are sparse. In this systematic review we attempt to characterize the risk factors. Methods. We systematically reviewed (PubMed, EMBASE, WHOLIS, Google Scholar, Wiley online, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL)) case-control studies and case series from 1980 to 2016 that reported risk factors for IS and/or HS in SSA. For each risk factor we calculated random-efects pooled odds ratios (ORs) for case-control studies and pooled prevalence estimates for case series. Results. We identifed 12 studies, including 4,387 stroke patients. Pooled analysis showed that patients who had diabetes (OR = 2.39; 95% CI: 1.14–5.03) and HIV (OR = 2.46 (95% CI: 1.59–3.81) were at a signifcantly greater risk of sufering from all stroke types. Tere were insufcient data to examine these factors by stroke type. Among case series, the pooled prevalence of hypertension was higher for HS than for IS (73.5% versus 62.8%), while diabetes mellitus (DM) and atrial fbrillation (AF) were more prevalent among IS compared to HS (15.9% versus 10.6% and 9.6% versus 2.3%, respectively). Conclusions. Tere remain too few data from SSA to reliably estimate the efect of various factors on the risk of IS and HS. Furthermore, the vast majority of cases were identifed in hospital and so are unlikely to be representative of the totality of stroke cases in the communit

A scoping review on incentives for adoption of sustainable agricultural practices and their outcomes

The increasing pressure on agricultural production systems to achieve global food security and prevent environmental degradation necessitates a transition towards more sustainable practices. The purpose of this scoping review is to understand how the incentives offered to farmers motivate the adoption of sustainable agricultural practices and, ultimately, how and whether they result in measurable outcomes. To this end, this scoping review examines the evidence of nearly 18,000 papers on whether incentive-based programmes lead to the adoption of sustainable practices and their effect on environmental, economic and productivity outcomes. We find that independent of the incentive type, programmes linked to short-term economic benefit have a higher adoption rate than those aimed solely at providing an ecological service. In the long run, one of the strongest motivations for farmers to adopt sustainable practices is perceived benefits for either their farms, the environment or both. Beyond this, the importance of technical assistance and extension services in promoting sustainable practices emerges strongly from this scoping review. Finally, we find that policy instruments are more effective if their design considers the characteristics of the target population, and the associated trade-offs between economic, environmental and social outcomes