World Health Day 2026 is upon us, and this year the theme is “Together for health. Stand with science”, celebrating the power of scientific collaboration to protect the health of people, animals, plants, and the planet. The campaign highlights both “scientific achievements and the multilateral cooperation needed to translate evidence into action, with a strong focus on the One Health approach”.

BMJ Open publishes research across a wide range of topics and study designs, and in this blog post we highlight recently published papers that demonstrate how scientific collaboration and cross-sectoral efforts can improve health outcomes.

A mixed-methods study by Shaw et al. evaluated the implementation of UCLP-PRIMROSE, a care pathway developed to reduce cardiovascular disease risk and mental health relapse in people with severe mental illness within the current NHS context. The research explored key processes, barriers, and facilitators to implementation, drawing on perspectives from both clinical and non-clinical staff across primary and secondary care. The authors identified alignment between staff values and the UCLP-PRIMROSE model, along with strong leadership as key drivers of success. Overall, implementation was moderately successful within a relatively short timeframe.

Similarly, Harkness et al evaluated an integrated service combining diabetes and mental health care for individuals with type 1 diabetes and disordered eating. Using a mixed-methods design, including input from patients and staff across a range of roles, survey data, and detailed economic costing, the study found that these integrated services were positively received by both staff and patients.

In addition, a scoping review by Tang et al aimed to identify how pharmacies in the UK, already embedded in communities and widely accessed for vaccination, can also act as accessible hubs for delivering additional brief cardiovascular healthcare screening interventions. Authors found that community pharmacies offer an optimal setting for integrating cardiovascular-related screening interventions with the vaccination service, facilitated by their accessibility and convenience compared with primary care.

Together, these studies reinforce the importance of cross-sectoral collaboration in improving health outcomes.

In addition to these studies, BMJ Open continues to support research advancing the One Health approach. We look forward to the findings of a recently published protocol by van der Sande et al., which aims to use a metagenomic approach to identify antimicrobial resistance patterns in low- and middle-income countries and inform the design of integrated One Health interventions.

#StandWithScience #WorldHealthDay