Maternal, Newborn And Child Health In Korogocho And Viwandani: Relief Is Here ! Literally!

By Deborah Ghati Mupusi, Senior Communications Assistant

July 13, 2012

July 2012  marks a new phase in APHRC’s work in Korogocho and Viwandani. This is because of a new project to improve the wellbeing of mothers, newborns and young children in the settlements.

The new project aims to harness the potential in public-private partnerships among various actors in health service delivery to improve maternal, newborn and child health (MNCH) services and outcomes in two Nairobi slum settlements.

Through this project, APHRC hopes to transform the way health services are offered in the two communities, the way private providers relate with the public sector and vice versa and the way the community engages with the formal health sector to improve their own health.

APHRC will work closely with various actors in the Ministry of Health through the Nairobi provincial health office, the City Council of Nairobi (CCN), district health management teams for Kasarani and Makadara, local leaders and youth leaders in the two settlements. The project marks unprecedented engagement by APHRC with all these actors in a partnership that should deliver quality, accessible and affordable services for mothers, newborns and young children in Korogocho and Viwandani. It also marks a new phase in APHRC’s work where the emphasis is more on service provision in the two communities and less on the research.

The project was motivated by research findings from APHRC’s work in the last few years. An assessment of the number of health facilities serving the two settlements has shown that only one in a hundred are public (government run) and so the majority of services are provided by private health facilities. Health workers in these private facilities do not always benefit from government programs and do not always get up to date training in new ways of treating diseases and providing care. This is because most training opportunities are taken up by health workers in the public sector.

The new project will provide these opportunities to health workers in the private sector to bring them up to date with the latest practice in family planning, ante-natal care for pregnant women, delivery care, newborn care, and care for young children. Apart from the training of health workers several health facilities will be upgraded and equipped to provide high quality services. These facilities will be supported by the local district health authorities through regular supervision and provision of critical supplies. The community will participate by organizing referral systems for the women and their children and ensuring that come rain or shine every woman or child that needs to get to a health facility gets there – in time and in one piece.

This project will be made possible by the generous support of Comic Relief –UK. Relief is on the way for Korogocho and Viwandani’s mothers and children – literally…