Mapping health research capacity in 17 countries of the former Soviet Union and south-eastern Europe: an exploratory study

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Policies to improve health status, tackle disease and ensure equitable access to healthcare should be informed by evidence derived from high-quality research. However, health research capacity is unevenly distributed across countries, as revealed by mapping exercises that have been undertaken to provide a basis for concerted action to strengthen capacity. This study systematically describes capacity to undertake health research in the countries of the former Soviet Union and south-eastern Europe and identifies the elements required to create a national health research system. METHODS: The mapping exercise comprised two elements: a survey of key informants in the respective countries and a bibliometric analysis of scientific publications in the field of public health. RESULTS: Our results confirm that health research remains a low priority in some countries of the WHO European Region. In these countries, most of the literature was produced by researchers outside the country, often to inform international donors. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides important information for countries seeking to initiate action to strengthen their research capacity. There is a need for a comprehensive strategy with sustained investment in training and career development of researchers. There is also a need to create new funding systems to provide financial support to those undertaking policy-relevant research. International collaboration and investment in mechanisms to bridge the gap between research and policy are urgently required.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 10 citations exist upstream.

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.