With increased migration around the world posing unique challenges and opportunities for health systems, efforts to better integrate and include migrants and host communities in national health systems are an integral part of the global health equity agenda. 

This brief describes opportunities to improve financial protection programs using behavior change approaches. The Practice Spotlights Social and Behavior Change series supports USAID’s Vision for Health System Strengthening 2030 by exploring how social and behavior change approaches can contribute to countries’ health system strengthening efforts.

This brief introduces the social determinants of health (SDOH) concept and terminology, and discusses approaches to addressing SDOH. Understanding these root causes of health inequities and their impact on health care access, quality, and equity is crucial to strengthening health systems.

This brief includes a global evidence review of DFS for health conducted by LHSS and an analysis of two programmatic case studies of DFS for health by Management Sciences for Health (MSH) through the Digital Square initiative.

This learning brief can be used as a resource for HRH managers, planners, program managers, and frontline practitioners to learn how other countries are approaching and successfully designing and implementing solutions to their HRH challenges. It can also be used as a reference for health policy makers, funders, and implementing partners to inform the design and implementation of HRH resource optimization initiatives covered in this brief.

Civil society organizations in Timor-Leste are playing important roles to identify health system problems and solutions, contribute ideas to the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) annual action plan, and participate in monitoring that holds the government accountable.

Returning funds to the Ministry of Finance at the end of the fiscal year is the last thing any Ministry of Health wants to do. In Peru, health budget officials are rolling out a strategy to stop that from happening.

This two-pager focuses on USAID’s Learning Question 5, “What are effective and sustainable mechanisms or processes that enable the participation of private sector, civil society, and public organizations in developing locally-led solutions to improve high-performing health care, especially for poor and vulnerable populations? What enables the effective participation or leadership of marginalized populations themselves in the development and implementation of these solutions? Under what conditions is this participation different?”

To advance progress toward universal health coverage, agreed-upon health priorities need to be reflected in national plans and budgets. This blog offers key lessons for ministries of health seeking to make that happen.

This two-pager focuses on USAID’s Learning Question 2, “What conditions or factors successfully facilitate the institutionalization and/or implementation at scale of good practices that improve health system outcomes, and why? What are lessons learned regarding planning for sustainability and achieving results at scale?”

Uniéndose, las organizaciones locales y regionales están trazando un camino adelante para mejorar el acceso a la atención médica para las mujeres y otros migrantes vulnerables en Honduras.

Joining together, local and regional organizations are plotting a way forward to improve health care access for women and other vulnerable migrants in Honduras. 

Routine stakeholder engagement is critical to fair and inclusive national priority setting for health, but many countries face challenges in ​​reaching key groups. This blog shares promising practices for bringing in key stakeholders and making sure the loudest voices aren’t the only ones heard.

Colombia ha emergido como líder en la elaboración de políticas que integran a los migrantes a la economía y la sociedad, garantizan su derecho universal a la salud y movilizan recursos nacionales para cumplir con la creciente demanda de servicios de salud.

​​​For countries wanting to strengthen health budget execution, learning about promising approaches used by others is one thing but putting them into practice is another. This blog reveals how two countries, Lao PDR and Peru, adapted promising practices and began to implement them.