Researchers working across National Centres of AHOP are to write in a particular style that is consistent with the African Health Observatory Platform (AHOP) and World Health Organisation (WHO). The AHOP’s abridged version of the full WHO editorial style manual, which draws on the abridged style guides used by WHO Africa Regional Office (AFRO) and the European Observatory on Health Systems & Policies can be downloaded below. The style guide aims to ensure correctness, consistency, impartiality, and credibility across AHOP outputs, both electronic and print, and offers guidance on avoiding the most common stylistic errors. Please, note that this guide is a living document and will be adapted as further decisions are made on AHOP style across the various outputs. It is intended to be used alongside the full WHO Style Guide. Both Guides are expected to guide persons who write across the AHOP project.
The Association of Public Health Physicians of Nigeria (APHPN) held its annual scientific conference at Abuja, Nigeria. The conference featured over 55 selected abstracts from a large pool of submissions. HPRG, under the African Health Observatory Platform (AHOP) presented a synthesis of findings from secondary sources on “crowding out of essential healthcare services amidst COVID-19”. The presentation was made by some members from the AHOP Nigeria Centre. They include Chinyere Okeke, Uche Ezenwaka, Chinelo Obi, Benjamin Uzochukwu, and Obinna Onwujekwe.
The well-researched presentation highlighted the huge burden of COVID-19 on the Nigerian health system, which overwhelmed health resources, with severe impacts on essential healthcare services (EHS). There were mentions of preventable health complications and mortalities that resulted from a somewhat overstretch of health resources. The scholars argued the need for a study of this kind to document the “why” of crowding out of healthcare services during disease outbreaks, and the responses that are expected. The implication of this study to the strengthening of health systems building blocks such as service delivery and governance cannot be overstated.
It is common to find editors of journals ask scholars to make their research papers appeal to a wider readership. By this, they imply that scholars should move away from a narrow lens, which could be their disciplines, communities or countries as target readers and users of their research findings. When these papers are finally published with a wider readership in mind, they might end up just with co-academics who are doing related studies or students researching around the subject. Hence, they circulate just within the academic walls, and at best, might fetch scholars some Google or Scopus citations and/or reads from ResearchGate. So, is that the reason we should publish our research?
If undergoing strenuous activities from research conceptualization to data collection, analysis and presentation, and at last, publishing in a peer-reviewed journal after tons of revision, would end up just with colleagues or researching students, then scholars might just agree to take off the “problem solving” description attached to the meaning of research. We know most persons within the league of the above-mentioned groups might not have the wherewithal to readily move our studies into practice. Thus, there is an urgent need to spread the “reach” of our studies and expand their ends to attract practicable impacts that should be the highest fulfilment for scholars. And if we must start this conversation, we should begin by asking ourselves this question – who reads our research?
Blogs or Publications??
We should be frank enough to accept that many of our students will happily read a news editorial than our publications just because they would not want to be fixed in an academic hotbed which our publications reflect. A handful will prefer to read novels than our 15-paged publications, for the obvious reason that they seem to have a dislike for the stress academics puts them through which we know is typical of publications. Besides, we might have noticed that the many in-text citations that dot our publications are scary to these groups of non-academics but sits just fine with academics.
Have you ever tried to pass a publication to a politician, a public office holder, or an important community actor? Have you tried to gauge their reactions, especially in climes like Africa where reading is “death” to many? Yet these public office holders and community actors would happily read a simple writeup published in a daily or a Facebook post or one of these shared writeups on WhatsApp. And we know that most of these public office holders and community actors are important stakeholders in the practical utilization of the knowledge from our studies. When they are well involved, they can help push knowledge from our studies into physical realities. Therefore, appealing to these groups of persons should be a vital part of our research, and in this article, we share the sentiments that blogs can do the job.
Quick stats!!
In 2018 and 2020, we published two articles in The Conversation a famous blog outlet, while the larger study was published in Health Policy and Planning a popular health policy and systems research journal. We discovered that as of April 2021, each of our articles in the blog outlet got over 6200 reads and counting, while the journal article got below 4500 page views and not up to 1000 downloads, even that it was published before the second blog article. See images below:
Statistics of readership from The ConversationStatistics of views from Health Policy and Planning
Are scholars bothered?
In a study, scholars agreed to declare an academic emergency in the world of scholarship. They said, scholars must come together to discuss among themselves the need for seamless research communication, condensing research outputs into easy-to-read formats. These professionals shared the sentiment that their studies are often for a clique of co-academic, even when they know that non-academic groups and policymakers would immensely benefit from the wealth of knowledge and evidence their researches offer. They cited that the journalist would easily reach the hearts of communities and policymakers than the academic because of the seamless and easy-to-read way they adopt in the communication of knowledge. Interestingly, they had a consensus to evolve their research communication by introducing formats with which the public can easily relate, and they include blogs, infographics, cartooning, animation, filming, etc. Unfortunately, most academics are not inclined to these outlets.
Doing blogs is never less professional!!
Scholars are known for jargons, and you can find many of them in their published studies. We know how jargons stall the passage of information. So, a health scientist might be interested in econometrics, then he or she stumbles on a paper in that regard but gets discouraged to read further because the concepts are too high and difficult to relate with. This is where the power of a blog is made manifest. It is a rule of thumb that blog writers should have a college fresher in mind. The jargons and the high-handed knowledge must be condensed to what the college fresher can read and grasp.
Would scholars not be pleased if the big concepts are made so understandable to all? Please, we do not attempt to neglect the importance of keeping the writing professional and appealing to peers on that level but we feel that there is more to just the academic community. You can try to issue an editorial from a daily and a journal publication to your teenage son or daughter, and judge which will appeal more to them. Stretching the readership of our publications beyond our academic colleagues to the non-academic groups is an evolving responsibility for scholars. And blogs aim to marry these ends, which in turn will benefit the expansion and practicability of our research.
We cannot deny that there is a rapid change in the academic industry with a focus on research communication. We have seen big agencies sponsoring blog outlets and academic institutions building blogs into their various academic communities. Amidst these changes, many are yet to embrace this evolution. A core reason is that these blogs might not count as a part of their promotion criteria or that blogs do not reveal them in their professional regalia, because of how common and down-to-earth the blog writer is forced to sound.
Getting promoted is a good sight and revelling in your professional regalia through the appropriate use of jargons and concepts could account for a quality scholar. But should it be all about ourselves? Should we not think of our research impacts transcending beyond the academic walls? Are we comfortable being known, respected and hailed just among co-scholars? Are we concerned about those who need “quick-reads” and not our “too serious” academic papers? Also, are we fair and just knowing that our academic publications could be closed-access and so much money needed to gain access?
We conclude!!
Have you ever wondered what it would look like if your students come to class to celebrate your piece published in a blog that they found on Twitter? Or a village-head expressing gratitude for your article he or she read on a daily? Or a policymaker talking about how your blog was a quick go-to while in a meeting where important decisions were reached? And importantly, that our condensed research outputs in blog formats increase accessibility for those without the money to pay “subscription fees” to quality studies? We believe it will make more sense to you to share a blog link to the WhatsApp group of your community chiefs than to share an academic publication there, and you can tell the reason if truthful to yourself. It is important that academics come to know that the academic community is not just the target end for research, and there is more to the “reach”. And in that “more” lies the ultimate!
Obinna Onwujekwe is a Professor of Health Economics, Systems and Policies at the University of Nigeria Enugu Campus. He is the Chief Editor of the African Journal of Health Economics, and the Coordinator of the Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria. He also coordinates the African Health Observatory Platform (AHOP) for Health Systems, Nigeria Center.
Prince Agwu is an academic at the Department of Social Work, University of Nigeria and a research associate at the Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria. He holds a Commonwealth PhD Position at the University of Dundee, Scotland, and he is the Communication Lead for the African Health Observatory Platform (AHOP) for Health Systems, Nigeria Center.
The Nigeria National Centre of AHOP (Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria) held a two-day inaugural with their three National AHOP Partners- The Nigerian Institute of Medical Research (NIMR), Veritas University Abuja and the Association of Public Health Physicians of Nigeria (APHPN), from 02-03 December 2020. The AHOP concept, goals and objectives were shared with the partners. The partners also shared their previous and on-going experiences of generating Health Policy and Systems Research (HPSR) evidence and getting research into Policy and Practice (GRIPP). This was followed by a brainstorming session, to propose tasks in the next steps to generate evidence with a focus on Universal Health Coverage. Partners committed to, in the first instance, developing a clear institutional framework for engaging with AHOP over the project period and beyond, identifying current strengths, weaknesses, and ideas for further capacity building. The Nigeria NC is happy to have been able to eventually hold this meeting, which was originally scheduled for April, 2020 but cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions.
Present at the meeting were:
Obinna Onwujekwe – Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria
Benjamin Uzochukwu – Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria
Enyi Etiaba – Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria
Chinyere Mbachu – Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria
Chinyere Okeke – Health Policy Research Group, University of Nigeria
It is expected that the partners will work together with the HPRG-UNN to scale up the collection and synthesis of data and information on health policy and system for evidence-based strengthening of Nigeria’s health system. Overall, the aim is to move data and information from the point of rhetoric to policies, strategies, and practices.
The World Health Organization (WHO) and partners launched an online platform today to promote the exchange of evidence and experience across countries in the African region. By working to foster evidence-informed decision-making in an endeavor to re-engineer health service delivery, the initiative is expected to drive countries’ health system resilience efforts.
The African Health Observatory Platform on Health Systems and Policy (AHOP) aims to facilitate cross-country learning and accelerate the uptake of high-quality evidence and experiences reflecting the complexity and diversity of the region. This knowledge translation effort will ultimately help strengthen national and regional health system design and performance.
“This is a significant step. So much data and research in Africa is produced, but not always shared,” said Dr Humphrey Karamagi, the Team Leader of Data, Analytics and Knowledge Management at WHO Regional Office for Africa. The experience-sharing occurring between countries on all types of health conditions could be used to deliver services that people are actually asking for.”
Leading public health research institutions in Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda and Senegal are generating knowledge through the collection, analysis and synthesis of evidence for use by decision-makers at national and regional levels. Through frequent policy-maker input and engagement, AHOP seeks to respond to policy needs with timely support and reliable evidence tailored and packaged in ways that are useful and usable for policy-makers.
Outputs range from country-specific profiles covering health systems and their performance, to policy briefs on topical issues requiring evidence to guide decision-making. It is expected that the number of national centres will rapidly expand to bring more countries and institutions on board.
A consortium of technical partners, including the London School of Economics and Political Science and the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies, support the national centres in producing locally-led analyses. The WHO Regional Office for Africa ensures regional relevance of the different analyses.
AHOP complements the larger WHO integrated African Health Observatory (iAHO), currently the most comprehensive, freely available online repository for data, analytics and knowledge on health for decision-makers, researchers, stakeholders and citizens in the region.
“By adding the knowledge component, we want to provide a one-stop shop that will bridge the gap between research and decision-makers to accelerate the progress towards access to affordable and quality health services,” Dr Karamagi said.
This joint initiative is supported by grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
“We welcome the opportunity to work with the programme partners to foster national, regional and global knowledge exchange and dialogue on health systems.”
Elias Mossialos, LSE Head of the Department of Health Policy
European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies
“As Chair of the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies, and on behalf of the partners, I am delighted that we have been able to work with colleagues in the WHO Regional Office for Africa, at LSE and from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on this important initiative. We hope that by sharing our experiences of how to make evidence work for policy makers we can strengthen AHOP’s knowledge brokering and in turn, learn from them how to strengthen our own practice.”
Liisa-Maria Voipio-Pulkki, Chair of the Steering Committee of the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies
