There has been a growing trend of task shifting in primary health care services including the use of community health workers (CHWs) in diagnosis of childhood illness. This study examines the role of traditional healers, their ability to meet the needs of families within communities and their integration into the health system in Tshopo through 127 in depth interviews with community members and health providers. It compares their performance to those of CHWs.
This paper investigates the impact of community-based newborn care package in Nepal. The research found that significant improvements in newborn care practices had not yet occurred, though the study represents an early assessment. The study's findings were taken into account upon revision of the package.
This paper looks at the potential to shift prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV tasks from nurses to community health workers (CHWs). This study measures the time nurses dedicate to these activities in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in order to estimate the potential cost savings of having CHWs take up these tasks. The paper found that task-shifting could allow nurses to focus on more specialized tasks, while reducing the average cost per patient.
Tremendous challenges remain to ensure that the most vulnerable populations, including women, children, and adolescents, are able to enjoy the healthy lives and well-being promised in the Sustainable Development Goals. Much of their poor health is caused by poverty, gender, lack of education, and social marginalization as well as inaccessible healthcare services. Strong, equitable, and well-governed health systems can contribute to sustainably improving their lives.
Humanitarian crises are often marked by large-scale, externally funded, and vertically managed responses. National health systems, already weak, are often bypassed by international organizations in the interest of rapid response to save lives. There is growing recognition, however, of the importance of employing more sustainable approaches through existing health system infrastructure to ensure services continue as the emergency subsides and organizations and their resource flows end.
An estimated 2.8 million neonatal deaths occur annually worldwide, three-quarters in Africa and Asia. These deaths are due largely to preventable causes, with neonatal infection accounting for 24% of all neonatal deaths. In low-resource community-based settings, care-seeking for neonatal illnesses can be triggered through two paths.
World Vision's Timed and Targeted Counselling for Health and Nutrition (ttC) is a comprehensive training course for CHWs, Care Groups and volunteers working in maternal and child health. ttC takes a life-cycle approach, supporting through pregnancy to two years of age, which offers the best opportunity to put children on a path to life-long health.
Lay community health workers (CHWs) have been widely used to provide curative interventions in communities that have traditionally lacked access to health care. Optimal performance of CHWs managing children with malaria, pneumonia and diarrhoea in communities is desired if a reduction in childhood morbidity and
mortality is to be achieved.
The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that approximately 500,000 children each year are diagnosed with tuberculosis (TB) and 64,000 HIV-negative children die annually due to TB. The true burden of childhood TB is unknown; children are often undiagnosed and therefore do not receive appropriate care. Childhood TB is often seen with other common childhood illnesses such as HIV/ AIDS, pneumonia and malnutrition, and should be considered in sick children, particularly in areas of high TB burden.
This study sought to understand the experience of the integrated community case management of childhood illnesses (iCCM) program in Accra and the Northern Region of Ghana from the local UNICEF staff, their partners, researchers, CHWs and others. Results found that both mothers and facility level staff appreciated CHWs efforts to localize the treatment of childhood illnesses. Despite appreciation of the expanded CHW role, there was concern of CHW’s being unpaid, poorly supervised, regularly out of stock, lacking in essential equipment, and remaining outside the formal health system.
