Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Jul 28:9:661490.
doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2021.661490. eCollection 2021.

One Health Evaluation: A Case Study at the University of Bologna

Maurizio Aragrande  1 , Massimo Canali  1 , Mariana Roccaro  2 , Elisabetta Ferraro  2 , Alessandra Bonoli  3 , Federica Savini  2 , Silvia Piva  2 , Laura Gallina  2 , Angelo Peli  2 , Vittorio Sambri  4 , Alessandra Scagliarini  4
Affiliations

One Health Evaluation: A Case Study at the University of Bologna

Maurizio Aragrande et al. Front Public Health. .

Abstract

The level of One Health (OH), or "One Health-ness," of health interventions has been defined as the capacity to operate according to six dimensions concerning OH operations and OH infrastructures, respectively (thinking, planning, and working; and information sharing, reciprocal learning, and systemic organization). Although health initiatives and research increasingly claim their orientation toward OH, such a capacity is rarely assessed. The objective of this study is to evaluate the One Health-ness of the academic team of the University of Bologna (UNIBO Team) working in the "ELEPHANT" project (Empowering universities' Learning and rEsearch caPacities in the one Health Approach for the maNagement of animals at the wildlife, livestock and human interface in SouTh Africa). This project involves universities, six from South Africa and two from Europe, and aims at embedding OH in research and learning to enable the control of diseases at the human, animal, and environmental interface, and to emphasize the interests of local African communities with wildlife conservation. The methodology adopts the NEOH method, developed in 2018 by the EU-COST Action, "Network for the Evaluation of One Health." The approach is based on questionnaires delivered to participants, which focus on the six OH dimensions, and then translate answers into quantitative metrics through the OH Index (OHI) and the OH Ratio (OHR). The following two evaluation levels are foreseen: the whole project and the single partner institutions. The evaluations are carried on in parallel, with preliminary, mid-term, and final assessments, to monitor the efficacy of the project actions. The preliminary evaluation of the UNIBO Team resulted in the OHI of 0.23 and the OHR of 1.69 which indicate a low degree of OH-ness and an imbalance between OH operation and OH infrastructure. The UNIBO case study will be the baseline for the evaluation of the other partner institutions involved in the ELEPHANT project. This type of evaluation can support the implementation of OH practices inside a project and underpin the strategies that allow to achieving more effective results. Any improvement in the OH-ness of each single academic team can be also considered as a result of the ELEPHANT project, thus showing its multiplier effect in the context.

Keywords: interdisciplinarity; one health; self-evaluation; system thinking; theory of change; transdisciplinarity.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. The handling editor declared a past co-authorship with MA and MC.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The system diagram of the UNIBO team.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Theory of change (TOC) of the UNIBO team.
Figure 3
Figure 3
The NEOH spider diagram for the OH-ness evaluation of the UNIBO team. Spider diagram based on the overall scores (from 0 to 1, solid lines) of the six dimensions for the One Health Index (OHI) of the UNIBO Team (the red structure) from the One Health (OH) perspective. The dashed line represents the division of the diagram into operation and infrastructure for representing the One Health Ratio (OHR) of the UNIBO Team.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. de Savigny D, Taghreed A. Systems Thinking for Health Systems Strengthening. Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research editor. Geneve: World Health Organization; (2009). Available at: https://www.who.int/alliance-hpsr/resources/9789241563895/en/ (accessed May 20, 2021).
    1. Min B, Allen-Scott LK, Buntain B. Transdisciplinary research for complex one health issues: a scoping review of key concepts. Prev Vet Med. (2013) 112:222–9. 10.1016/j.prevetmed.2013.09.010 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Kelly TR, Karesh WB, Johnson CK, Gilardi KVK, Anthony SJ, Goldstein T, et al. . One health proof of concept: bringing a transdisciplinary approach to surveillance for zoonotic viruses at the human-wild animal interface. Prev Vet Med. (2017) 137:112–8. 10.1016/j.prevetmed.2016.11.023 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Sinclair JR. Importance of a one health approach in advancing global health security and sustainable development goals. Rev Sci Tech Off Int Epiz. (2019) 38:145–54. 10.20506/rst.38.1.2949 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Barton Behravesh C. Introduction. One Health: over a decade of progress on the road to sustainability. Rev Sci Tech. (2019) 38:21–50. 10.20506/rst.38.1.2939 - DOI - PubMed

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources