Amrit Virk

University of Edinburgh | UoE · School of Social and Political Science

In Sierra Leone, physicians face a high risk of burnout due to systemic challenges, with studies suggesting a gap in recognizing and addressing this condition. We explored public-sector physicians’ experiences and perceptions of the organizational structures and characteristics needed to help them thrive in a resource-limited practice setting. We c...

Background Surgical services are scarce with persisting inequalities in access across populations and regions globally. As the world’s most populous county, India’s surgical need is high and delivery rates estimated to be sub-par to meet need. There is a dearth of evidence, particularly sub-regional data, on surgical provisioning which is needed to...

Nigeria is home to a significant and growing "youth" population, over a third of it below 24 years of age. The demographic potential for productivity and growth this group represents occurs alongside large-scale unemployment among young people of working age. The "unemployment crisis" has deep historical roots and exists within a wider context of p...

Background Surgical services are scarce with persisting inequalities in access across populations and regions globally. As the world’s most populous county, India’s surgical need is high and delivery rates estimated to be sub-par to meet need. There is a dearth of evidence particularly sub-regional data on surgical provisioning and need to aid plan...

Introduction: Surgical access is central to universalising health coverage, yet 5 billion people lack timely access to safe surgical services. Surgical need is particularly acute in post conflict settings like Sierra Leone. There is limited understanding of the barriers and opportunities at the service delivery and community levels. Focusing on fra...

Health system reforms across high- and middle-income countries often involve changes to public hospital governance. Corporatization is one such reform, in which public sector hospitals are granted greater functional independence while remaining publicly owned. In theory, this can improve public hospital efficiency, while retaining a public service...

Introduction There continues to be a large gap between need and actual use of surgery in low-resource settings. While policy frequently focuses on expanding the supply of services, demand-side factors are at least as important in determining under utilisation and over utilisation. The aim of this study is to understand how these factors influence t...

There is growing evidence that political economy factors are central to whether or not proposed health financing reforms are adopted, but there is little consensus about which political and institutional factors determine the fate of reform proposals. One set of scholars see the relative strength of interest groups in favour of and opposed to refor...

Background To improve health in low-resource settings, it is imperative to enhance (a) design of interventions, (b) piloting of interventions, and (c) analyse the processes through which interventions are implemented and how they are used and perceived by key stakeholders. Applied qualitative research is a potential approach. Objectives • identif...

Background International health projects are increasingly engaging local researchers to ensure that interventions are cost-effective and locally relevant. Yet, locating research partners in low and middle-income country settings is not always straightforward particularly when projects are inter-disciplinary, the methods unfamiliar, and the setting,...

Objective To provide an overview of the current state of research of advance care planning (ACP), highlighting most studied topics, publication time, quality of studies and reported outcomes, and to identify gaps to improve ACP receptivity, utilization, implementation, and outcomes. Method Cochrane methodology for conducting overviews of systemati...

Background: Advance care planning (ACP) involves important decision-making about future medical needs. The high volume and disparate nature of ACP research make it difficult to grasp the evidence and derive clear policy lessons for policymakers and clinicians. Aim: To synthesise ACP research evidence, and identify relevant contextual elements, p...

Many low- and middle-income countries have introduced State-funded health programmes for vulnerable groups as part of global efforts to universalise health coverage. Similarly, India introduced the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) in 2008, a publicly-funded national health insurance scheme for people below the poverty line. The authors explore...

Supplement to: Mullan Z, Jupp S. The Lancet/Global Forum essay competition winners 2010. Lancet 2010; published online Nov 16.