Achieving high-quality primary healthcare (PHC) remains essential to improving health systems performance and advancing progress towards attainment of universal health coverage, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where gaps in service delivery persist. Capacity-building interventions, such as mentorship, in-service training and supportive supervision, have been widely employed to improve the quality of PHC delivery. The evidence base is, however, fragmented across diverse settings, intervention types and outcome measures. This systematic review will examine the evidence on how capacity-building interventions improve the quality of PHC services in SSA, with a focus on the domains of effectiveness, safety, people-centredness, timeliness, equity, integration and efficiency as propounded by the WHO.

We will conduct a systematic review using established evidence synthesis methods and report the findings in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) 2020 guidelines. Eligible studies will include peer-reviewed and grey literature published in English between 2000 and 2025, focusing on capacity-building interventions aimed at improving PHC quality in SSA. We will search databases including PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, Scopus, Google Scholar and the African Journals Online. Study selection will follow the Population (PHC providers), Exposure (capacity-building interventions) and Outcome (quality of PHC delivery across WHO domains) framework. Quality assessment will use the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT). Data will be narratively synthesised using Atlas.ti software.

Ethical approval is not required because there will be no collection of primary data. Only published studies/records available on peer-reviewed literature and grey sources will be included. Findings will be disseminated through a peer-reviewed journal, academic conferences and stakeholder platforms in SSA.

The protocol has been registered in PROSPERO (CRD420251131534) and reported according to PRISMA-P guidelines.

Skin temperature assessment is essential for the diagnosis of cellulitis and monitoring treatment response, but is currently subjective and can contribute to overdiagnosis. We aimed to characterise skin temperature changes over time in cellulitis and compare two objective measurement approaches, a thermal imaging camera (TIC) and a non-contact infrared thermometer (NCIT).

A device comparison study nested within a prospective cohort. We measured limb temperatures daily for 4 days using a TIC and two NCITs.

Two acute hospitals in the UK’s National Health Service.

202 adults (age ≥18 years) diagnosed with lower limb cellulitis who attended hospital for antibiotic treatment.

We used linear mixed-effects models to quantify changes in temperature over time and intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) to assess reliability. We compared temperature measurements between devices using Lin’s concordance coefficients and Bland-Altman plots with estimated 95% limits of agreement.

202 patients were included: 95% white ethnicity. Baseline limb temperature differences varied between 2.4°C and 3.4°C, depending on the device. All devices showed significant reductions in affected limb temperature per day, with the largest decrease recorded by the TIC (–0.34°C per day, 95% CI –0.48°C to –0.19°C, p

Daily temperature changes may be too small for reliable monitoring at the individual patient level, but cumulative changes from day 0 to day 3 may be sufficient for clinical interpretation, despite limitations in the precision of device measurements. NCITs’ measurement capabilities differ widely, so these devices cannot be used interchangeably. Due to this and the potential benefits of advanced thermal image analysis, TICs should be prioritised for further study in cellulitis. Future research should confirm our findings in different skin tones and explore the clinical utility of thermal imaging in enabling earlier diagnosis or detecting signs of therapeutic failure.