CLOSING THE HEALTH GAP—INTERVENTIONS FOR ADRESSING POOR MEN’S HEALTH IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA: A SCOPING REVIEW

Abstract

The issue that this study addresses the poorer men’s health outcomes as compared to women in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). To address this problem, the purpose of this study scoping review was to take stock of health interventions conducted in SSA to engage men. A search of six electronic databases, a search of reference list of relevant systematic reviews and meta-analysis; and a search of grey literature, all reported in international languages spoken in Africa, were conducted. All studies evaluating health interventions that aimed to engage male young, adults and aged people in SSA, published between January 2000 and January 2018, were included. The electronic literature search identified 2815 original citations, full texts of 25 studies were screened and 12 studies were included. Additionally, 20 studies were retrieved from screening of reference lists of relevant articles and reviews, hence were also included. Main themes that were analysed included: geographic distribution of studies, the type of studies and main study focus, the type of gender programming, and the type of evidence gathered. This review found that Gender transformative interventions, delivered in community settings, using group discussions and workshops, were shown to be the most effective in reaching their goals. However, there is a significant literature and research bias toward HIV and SRH issues, paired with a scarcity of published studies in most SSA countries. Furthermore, the widespread use of cognitive variables to measure effectiveness of interventions may limit reliability of their findings.