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Urdu Version
Ms Nasreen Jaleel, Naib Nazima, City District Government
has appreciated Aga Khan University’s role in improving health
care facilities for vulnerable populations and has assured city
government’s full support to projects in collaboration with
grassroots level political leadership and the communities. She was
addressing the Report Launching Ceremony at the conclusion of a
research project by the Department of Community Health Sciences
of Aga Khan University on Tuesday.
She said that the city’s health budget for the year 2006-2007
has been increased by 90% to ensure improvement for the people of Karachi and
stressed on the need to work in collaboration towards improving the state of
health care in Karachi.
The research project “Engendering the Health System: Improving
the Quality of Health Services for Women” was conducted by AKU’s
Department of Community Health Sciences in collaboration with WHO-EMRO in 2005-2006
with participation of health care providers, community men and women in seven
areas of Gadap Town Karachi. The main objective of the project was to sensitise
the health care providers towards gender health needs of the women, and to initiate
empowerment among women for appropriate and timely health seeking behaviour.
Speaking at this occasion, Dr Babar Tasneem Shaikh, Senior Instructor
at CHS and the Principal Investigator of the project, said that lack of mobility,
no decision-making power, limited income, as well as prohibitions against seeking
care from male providers, present serious constraints to women's ability to
use the health care services that are available. There is an obvious gap between
health care providers and women, which needs to be bridged with practical interventions,
inducing a behaviour change at both ends - the community and the health care
professionals.
Dr Kausar S. Khan, Associate Professor, Department of CHS, emphasised
the need for participatory approach in all types of research work which entail
working with vulnerable groups of population. She also maintained that research
is worthwhile when it is disseminated and translated into health public policies.
Professor Gregory Pappas, Chairman CHS, thanked all the stakeholders
for being part of the research and appreciated their role which made the project
possible. EDO-Health Karachi, THO-Health Gadap Town, representatives of the
City Government, ‘Health And Nutrition Development Society’ (HANDS)
and the CHS faculty also attended the occasion.
The University appreciates that the endemic problems of a region
beset with financial difficulties and low development indicators
can be addressed only through relevant research focusing on producing
low cost, accessible and innovative solutions.
Urdu Version
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