"'I'm a Health Worker' - Abduaraman Gidi" made by IntraHealth International.
The FCHV Program in Nepal was initiated in 1988/89 with the goal of supporting national health through community involvement. Currently there are 52,000 FCHVs with varying roles and responsibilities related to health. This presentation discusses the 2014 survey aimed at understanding FCHVs perceptions of their work, as well as the communities’ perceptions of FCHVs. Using a mixed methods...
At the 21st International AIDS Conference in Durban, South Africa in July 2016, Dr. Katie Simon presented findings from a study highlighting how community health workers can be utilized to address tuberculosis case detection, which often infects people living with HIV. This study found that intensified tuberculosis case finding (TB ICF) by CHWs was associated with a 20-fold increase in TB case...
This brief explains how community health workers improve people’s health, reduce health care costs, and address barriers to care. The brief continues to discuss key questions regarding sustainable funding of CHW programs through Medicaid reimbursement for states that want to start or expand such programs. Case studies in Massachusetts, Minnesota, and New Mexico are presented, detailing how...
Results from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded Family Advancement for Life and Health project (FALAH), implemented from 2008-2012, show that the inclusion of men in family planning (FP) efforts is a feasible and effective intervention to help shift attitudes and behaviours in Pakistan and perhaps in other countries in the region and globally as well. This...
This brief discusses how integrating community health worker programs into the health system can help increase access to family planning by bringing information, services, and supplies to women and men in the communities where they live and work, rather than requiring them to visit health facilities. CHWs address geographic, financial, and social barriers in regards to family planning services...
Community Health Volunteers (CHVs) have played a critical role in the success of USAID in Madagascar’s health sector. As CHVs, they can provide basic health care services and health education at the community level, thus improving health care access in remote regions. This report highlights the successes and challenges of USAID/Madagascar’s investment in CHVs.
Critical shortages in the health workforce in many developing countries - specifically the number, skills and geographic distribution of health workers - pose a significant challenge to the achievement of universal health coverage and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Increasing attention has therefore been focused on the potential of community health workers (CHWs) to expand access to...
In light of the health worker shortage due to the post-conflict period and Ebola crisis in Sierra Leone, it is crucially important to understand different motivation factors for rural health workers, including doctors, nurses, midwives and Community Health Workers. Researchers conducted 23 participatory life histories with health workers, revealing that the context of the rural healthcare...
Recent years have proven that community health workers serve important roles in healthcare systems, including in the United States. This article briefly discusses the effectiveness and versatility of community health workers and their various roles in healthcare delivery systems. The evidence demonstrates the effectiveness of community health workers in many diverse public health-related roles...
Progress Report of the Community Health Worker (CHW) Core Consensus (C3) Project: Building National Consensus on CHW Core Roles, Skills, and Qualities :
This project focuses on U.S. CHW roles, skills, and qualities and how these shape CHW practice. Collaborating with a number of different state and local CHW associations, the project conducted several different analyses to identify the...
Advancing Partners & Communities (APC) advances and supports community programs that improve the overall health of communities and achieve other health-related impacts, especially in relationship to family planning. The project increases access to community-based health services, spanning a spectrum of health issues. Implemented by JSI Research & Training Institute, Inc., in partnership with FHI 360, APC advances global learning by providing technical assistance to local partners and governments, generating new data and evidence, managing over 100 small and medium sized grants, and building the organizational and technical capacity of organizations to strengthen community health and family planning programming. APC’s work spans a wide spectrum of technical areas, including but not limited to: expanding access to quality health and FP services, building human resource capacity, strengthening policy and health systems, and integrating youth and gender into all of our activities. The changing landscape of health systems, combined with the shortage of highly skilled health providers, has created opportunities for scaling-up task sharing in the delivery of health and FP services at the community level.
Specific APC resources that may be of particular interest to implementers that work with CHWs are the Community Health Systems Catalog, the Community Health Worker Provision of Injectable Contraceptives suite of tools, and the first in a series of Community-based Health System Model briefs, focused on Nepal. Please visit APC’s website to learn more about the project and explore our many other resources. To learn about new resources and stay up to date on APC’s activities, please sign up for the newsletter.
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