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Biomedical subjects

N Milio

Publications and source records attributed to N Milio.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1999

The Medical Care Section: contending with the forces of progress and retrogression, 1965-1994.

The Medical Care Section placed its efforts at the leading edge of progressive change over 3 decades in the health interests of the public. The period ranged across national waves of expansion of the welfare state to retrenchment and accession to the market. Section members, both collectively and in their individual arenas, persisted in their efforts, regardless of favorable or unfavorable climates.

Health Care Reform↗
PubMed1998

Priorities and strategies for promoting community-based prevention policies.

The public health community faces major choices in priorities for its mission in a rapidly changing environment. One option is to place greater emphasis on public health policy development. Policy making requires a grasp of the interplay among stakeholders, policy makers, the press, and the public. A framework for gathering relevant information and guiding strategic action is a useful tool for participation in community, state, and national arenas in the interests of population health. Organization-targeted approaches can make policy advocacy, community mobilization, and public education about policy issues more effective. This requires investment in public health infrastructure.

Attitude to Health↗
PubMed1998

European food and nutrition policies in action. Finland's food and nutrition policy: progress, problems and recommendations.

Some progress has clearly been made in several aspects of Finland's food and nutrition policy: access to nutrition information and education, improvements in mass catering, increased availability of healthier food products, and pricing and quality requirements favourable to a healthy diet. Finnish eating patterns have improved in relation to some recommended foods and macronutrients. The structural changes in farm and food production are largely the result of new political and economic realities both in Finland and internationally, resulting in the Government focusing on fiscal efficiency, decentralization and a more competitive, consumer-oriented market. This new environment is creating pressures to reduce surplus animal fat production and to expand markets in new foods for Finns and other Europeans who, for reasons of demography, health or working or living arrangements, demand new and sometimes healthier foods. Within this context, some health leaders have been able to make and work for proposals that are consistent both with political and economic imperatives and with health needs. Although the populations health status is improving and in some respects is exemplary, diet-related death and illness rates and risk factors (such as serum cholesterol and obesity) are high and their decline, along with some healthy changes in eating patterns, has slowed since the mid-1980s (ironically, since the adoption of the nutrition policy). The more slowly improvements occur, the higher will be the social and economic costs. Major problems in policy implementation exist. Although much has been done in research and demonstration and in the development of national guidelines (in public catering and labeling, for example) there is an apparent lag in translating such soft technology into action and monitoring its implementation in order to develop corrective measures at the operational level. This problem may increase with decentralized budget control and a less regulated market, where listening to the consumer (whether an individual, retailer or caterer) may not necessarily result in healthier products are more accurate consumer information, especially as foreign products and media continue to attract Finnish young people. The lack of a leading strategic body that can authoritatively assess and anticipate problems in implementation, deal with them and coordinate and monitor the necessary action in fundamental to these issues. Rapid progress in economic and farm policy development and food enterprises can provide conditions supportive of health and nutrition goals if such interests are systematically taken into account and allowed to moderate potential negative changes. If it is to be effective, such accounting will require initiative, clarity of strategic purpose and organization by health and nutrition leaders.

Finland↗
PubMed1996

US policy support for telehealth: organizational response to a new policy environment.

A sample of 40 from 176 public policy organizations in Washington, DC, was studied. The organizations were those whose leadership was deemed necessary to develop a new strategic vision of electronic technologies to support public health. The results showed that large, secure and well positioned organizations became active only to the extent of their mandates, while smaller and less influential groups, which were freer to think and act innovatively, had an incentive to work with other organizations to gain effective support for their policy positions. The conclusion is that the constituencies of leading policy organizations will have to ensure that well connected leaders and environmental scanning structures guide their organizations and that they have the institutional capacity to develop unconventional strategies to meet health challenges.

District of Columbia↗
PubMed1996

Electronic networks, community intermediaries, and the public's health.

Information technology (IT) has the potential to assist disadvantaged communities in gaining access to mainstream resources, and to a new kind of community health-supporting infrastructure. Federal and state information technology policy will affect how and how well community institutions can reach their goals, collaborate with service agencies, and effectively advocate investing essential, health-supporting resources in their communities. The current information technology focus of the health professions is institution and provider-oriented. It should have a wider scope to include community-based organizations. Laborious efforts undertaken by community-based organizations (CBOs) with only a patchwork of resources and without policy support suggest their value to the public's health. Increasingly burdened public health organizations should examine the public health interest in closing the gap between IT-poor and IT-rich organizations and develop a strategy for building inclusive electronic webs with CBOs.

Community Networks↗
PubMed1995

Beyond informatics: an electronic community infrastructure for public health.

Public health agencies are in the early stages of building an electronic infrastructure that will link them to each other and eventually to the "information superhighway." Emphasis in planning and development is on data systems and the information and training services that can enhance essential public health services. This article argues for a larger vision of the potential of electronic networks for public health. It discusses the health and other challenges facing public health, the limitations of conventional efforts, and the emerging consensus on public health core functions. Finally, it examines current and potential uses of information technology. The article concludes by proposing that the public health community should develop a collaborative and inclusive vision of public health in an electronic world and provide guidance and support for agency implementation to ensure a stronger system that can meet the health and health equity challenges ahead.

Community Networks↗
PubMed1992

Stirring the social pot. Community effects of program and policy research.

The increasing interest in a national health program will lead to major changes in healthcare. The coming changes will be larger perhaps than those of the past decade and almost certainly will be outward--outside large institutions, into communities. Community relations will become increasingly important and therefore should become a part of studies to guide administrative decisions regarding program development. Administrators and their research collaborators should be aware of the unintended "side effects" of such community-oriented research. These effects have organizational and research implications that decision makers may choose to use to build community-organization alliances and promote public education to create supportive and informed consumers and a responsive healthcare system.

Community Health Services↗
PubMed1991

Toward healthy longevity. Lessons in food and nutrition policy development from Finland and Norway.

For a variety of health, economic and social reasons, many countries are increasingly concerned about diet-related health problems impairing the quality and length of life. This article presents an analysis of the implementation of food and nutrition policies in Finland and Norway which are intended to address both the supply and demand aspects of food and dietary issues. The purpose was to identify policy problems and illustrate ways they have been addressed in order to be useful to other countries involved in developing such policies. The paper is based on on-site studies conducted in 1990, 1987, and 1980. Major findings indicate mixed progress due in part to problems in implementation. These include: development of an effective strategic capacity for planning, advocacy, coordination, and evaluation; integration into the health services system and other policy sectors; development of decentralized infrastructure for deploying policy; accuracy in public information on food and nutrition; the use of government market power, and social equity in the distribution of policy benefits and costs.

Finland↗