18 research outputs found

    Birthing practices of traditional birth attendants in South Asia in the context of training programmes

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    Traditional Birth Attendants (TBA) training has been an important component of public health policy interventions to improve maternal and child health in developing countries since the 1970s. More recently, since the 1990s, the TBA training strategy has been increasingly seen as irrelevant, ineffective or, on the whole, a failure due to evidence that the maternal mortality rate (MMR) in developing countries had not reduced. Although, worldwide data show that, by choice or out of necessity, 47 percent of births in the developing world are assisted by TBAs and/or family members, funding for TBA training has been reduced and moved to providing skilled birth attendants for all births. Any shift in policy needs to be supported by appropriate evidence on TBA roles in providing maternal and infant health care service and effectiveness of the training programmes. This article reviews literature on the characteristics and role of TBAs in South Asia with an emphasis on India. The aim was to assess the contribution of TBAs in providing maternal and infant health care service at different stages of pregnancy and after-delivery and birthing practices adopted in home births. The review of role revealed that apart from TBAs, there are various other people in the community also involved in making decisions about the welfare and health of the birthing mother and new born baby. However, TBAs have changing, localised but nonetheless significant roles in delivery, postnatal and infant care in India. Certain traditional birthing practices such as bathing babies immediately after birth, not weighing babies after birth and not feeding with colostrum are adopted in home births as well as health institutions in India. There is therefore a thin precarious balance between the application of biomedical and traditional knowledge. Customary rituals and perceptions essentially affect practices in home and institutional births and hence training of TBAs need to be implemented in conjunction with community awareness programmes

    Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam: From a Personal Lens

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    14-1

    India Needs ASSURED Innovation Policy

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    14-15India needs a new national innovation policy for economic and social development growth as well as competitiveness

    Report of the Technical Expert Group on Patent Law Issues

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    A Technical Expert Group on Patent Law Issues was set up by the Government of India, Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion to examine whether it would be TRIPS compatible to limit the grant of patent for pharmaceutical substance to new chemical entity or to new medical entity involving one or more inventive steps; and whether it would be TRIPS compatible to exclude micro-organisms from patenting. This is the report of the Group.patenting, new chemical entity, evergreening, TRIPS compatibiliy, NCE, NME, Indian Patent Act, Economics, Industry

    Obituary: Dr Raj Bhan – An Institution

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    10-11Individuals go but institutions stay on. So Raj, the Institution will stay on forever

    A systems-based model for the succesful scaling of inclusive innovation

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    Inclusive innovation literature provides manifold examples and some answers as to how projects can achieve the full potential of the BoP market and what factors can be considered important in determining the likelihood of an innovation’s success. But the existing literature and methods for analysis are mostly oriented towards firms’ strategies or project practices, focusing on the micro-level, including such things as products, project organisation, capacity building and the involvement of local stakeholders. Little or no attention has been paid to the surrounding context in which innovation occurs, or to the environmental sustainability of BoP products and technologies. This paper aims to contribute to the debate surrounding new models for innovation within the development sector and to explore the wider implications for innovation in the context of development policies. The central objective guiding this paper is therefore the elaboration of an analytical framework which can be subsequently implemented in analyses of system-wide factors for the successful scaling up of inclusive, sustainable innovations. The authors of this paper present a model for the analysis of the innovation (eco-) system of inclusive innovation. The model includes the following five dimensions: landscape, resources, knowledge, market, and support mechanisms. Ongoing work of the authors currently focuses on the application of this framework to a number of Inclusive innovation projects conducted within TNO’s Innovation for Development programme and a number of examples from the literature, particularly from India. The outcome of this ongoing work will provide policy conclusions, salient limitations and avenues for future researc

    From Van der Waals to Protein Crystallization

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