Journal Article
Measuring quality of health-care services

The United Nations sustainable development goal (SDG) 3 seeks “to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all and at all ages”. To build healthcare systems that were able to progress towards the millennium development goals, many countries had to extend delivery systems to increase coverage. They also greatly improved measurement of people’s contacts with the health system.

However, with the reduction in disease burden due to specific infectious diseases and childhood illnesses, people tend to live longer, have multiple noncommunicable diseases and require more complex services. The focus on measuring access is not sufficient to capture whether people receive effective care; hence this month’s papers on measurement of quality of care in low- and middle-income countries