Dear Colleagues,

Below you will find the Maternal and Child Health Updates- IHD’s Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Technical Segment’s bi-monthly newsletter to members of its Community of Excellence (COE).  In addition, the Technical Segment regularly circulates news items and updates on state of the art practices in MNCH through our MCHCOE listserve, keep a compilation of Abt’s MNCH capability statements, and are available to link you to appropriate technical assistance in project implementation and proposal development in relevant topics.  Please email Elizabeth Magnusson if you would like become a member of our community of excellence, and please email any stories or updates you would like to share about your work to Lara Hensley to be included in this newsletter in the future.

Regards,

Lisa Nichols and Lara Hensley 

Maternal and Child Health Updates

January 30, 2014

Abt updates

Introductions:  MNCH Strategic Lead - Judith Moore.  We are happy to introduce Judith Moore – our new MNCH Strategic Lead who is sitting in the Bethesda office.  Ms. Moore is a nurse midwife with more than 30 years of experience in public health programming focusing on women and children’s health. She has worked in a clinical and technical advisory capacity for both UK and USA governments, as well as major NGO’s (Save the Children UK and USA, Gates-funded Saving Newborn Lives grant, John Snow Inc. on the USAID Child Survival Program BASICS, and JHPIEGO). Judith has taught clinical midwifery, trained health workers, been deployed to several major humanitarian emergencies, and served in diverse program management roles and as a technical advisor at country, regional and headquarters levels.  Most recently, she comes from a position as Senior Director for Women and Children’s Health at Project HOPE, where she gained further experience with private sector initiatives, including working with major corporations.  Judith holds an MSc degree in Primary Health Care Management for Developing Countries from the University of Wales and a Diploma in Tropical Medicine from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She also was a fellow in the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  We look forward to working with Judith under her leadership and expanding Abt’s MNCH work!

The Health Policy Reform Project (HPR) in Peru assisted the government of San Martin, Peru in addressing child nutrition.  The 5-year USAID-funded HPR project strengthened health systems to improve the quality and coverage of health services for all Peruvians.  The project, which closed in December 2014, worked toward the following result areas: 1) governance of the health system; 2) health financing; 3) management of health information systems; 4) human resources for health; and 5) pharmaceutical supply chains.  One project activity specifically focused on the reduction of chronic child malnutrition (CCM) in the San Martin region of Peru.  Through this activity, the project identified and addressed service-related constraints to CCM reduction, and built the capacity of the MOH and Regional Government to carry out a decentralized health program. The intervention included the coordinated development of supportive policies and institutional norms, and improvements in the organization of services at the regional level.  Particular emphasis was placed on ensuring that facilities met minimum conditions for providing quality services to communities. Based on a constraints analysis, HPR supported changes in health policies, regulations, organizational structure, and service delivery that helped the MOH operationalize decentralization reform and contributed to a lower regional CCM rate (from 28.8% in 2010 to 15.49% at the end of 2013).  For more information about the projects successes please contact Alfredo Sobrevilla and Elizabeth MacGregor Skinner.

The HSS II Bridge Project Assists the Government of Jordan to Establish the “Maternal Mortality Surveillance and Response” System.  Over the past decade, the Abt-led Health Systems Strengthening (HSS) projects have contributed to significant reductions in maternal mortality in Jordan. However, current maternal mortality information is based on unreliable and outdated surveys with noticeable discrepancy between maternal mortality ratios reported by the Government of Jordan (GOJ) and the World Health Organization: 19 per 100,000 in 2008 versus 63 per 100,000 in 2013, respectively. To help address this, the project is introducing a maternal mortality surveillance and response (MMSR) system as an innovative method that aims to count maternal deaths, review their causes, respond by taking corrective actions, disseminate the response, and better monitor progress working with important Jordanian stakeholders.

To do this, Abt’s HSS II Bridge guided by the MOH Secretary General is establishing a technical working group (TWG) to encourage broad collaboration to meet national criteria and address all the relevant policies.  This TWG develop a baseline assessment of maternal mortality reporting, from which a conceptual framework for a comprehensive MMSR system will be designed and rolled out with the MOH in Summer 2015.   The MMSR model will include mechanisms for maternal death identification, notification, review, analysis, and response to provide the essential information, which is then disseminated and monitored to stimulate and guide actions to prevent future maternal deaths and improve the measurement of maternal mortality. This connection between maternal mortality surveillance and response (corrective action) is at the core of an accountability framework to reduce maternal mortality and improve maternal health.   For more information please contact Dr. Sabry Hamza.

Noteworthy Articles, Posts, and Recently Released Tools and Publications:

Articles

Development of the integrated Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Pneumonia and Diarrhea.  This article which appeared in the British Medical Journal (Qazi S, et al. Arch Dis Child 2015;100(Suppl 1):s23–s28. doi:10.1136/archdischild-2013-305429) presents the findings of a series of five workshops to facilitate the inclusion of pneumonia and diarrhea into the national health plans of 36 countries with high child mortality.  It also discusses their contribution the development of the integrated Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Pneumonia and Diarrhea, outlining necessary actions to end  pneumonia and diarrhea related child deaths by 2025.  Read the whole article here.   For more information on Abt’s diarrhea and pneumonia program through the SHOPS project, please contact Vicki MacDonald or Saiqa Panjsheri.

The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Report on the Global Financing Facility.  In December the PMNCH released this report on its recent consultation process on the GFF to support Every Woman Every Child.  The report synthesizes a five week review of interviews with and inputs from more than 1400 individuals and organization which were aggregated using quantitative and qualitative research methods.  The report is available for download in both French and English here.

Using a school-based approach to deliver immunization—Global update.  This article, which appeared in Vaccine (Volume 33, Issue 5, 29 January 2015, Pages 719–725), examines where and how school based approaches to immunization are used, and what antigens are being disseminated in this way.  It concludes that schools can be a platform to reach school age children with immunizations.   The full article is available here.

Posts

US Pledges to Support Gavi.  USAID announced on January 27th, its pledge to support Gavi with $1billion, subject to congressional approval.  This will support the Gavi’s goal of immunizing 300 million additional children.  Read the press release here.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation released its Annual Letter.  Section 1 focuses on the Gates’ view on achievable improvements in Maternal and Child health over the next 15 years.   The complete letter is available here.   

Webinar recording - Water and Sanitation and Child Health.   The CORE group hosted a webinar entitled “Multi-Sectoral Approaches to Improve Child Growth, through WASH, Nutrition, and Early Childhood Development” in January.  “The CORE Group Nutrition and Social and Behavior Change Working Groups, in collaboration with the USAID WASHplus Project, hosted a one-hour webinar on multi-sectoral approaches to improve child growth and development; with a focus on improving the community knowledge of practice and sharing integration efforts for ECD, nutrition and WASH integration. The Clean, Fed & Nurtured community of practice explained why water, sanitation and hygiene, nutrition, and early childhood development should be integrated. A 35-minute presentation, followed by 25 minutes of facilitated discussion. “  It is available here.

Tools and Publications

New USAID new document - Ending Preventable Maternal Mortality: USAID Maternal Health Vision for Action Evidence for Strategic Approaches.  In January, USAID issued this document which complements it vision statement, Ending Preventable Maternal Mortality: USAID Maternal Health Vision for Action, released last June.   This document discusses in more detail the 10 Strategic Drivers to preventing Maternal Mortality as introduced in the vision document. Download the document yourself here.  

The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Report on the Global Financing Facility (GFF).  In December the PMNCH released this report on its recent consultation process on the GFF to support Every Woman Every Child.  The report synthesizes a five week review of interviews with and inputs from more than 1400 individuals and organization which were aggregated using quantitative and qualitative research methods.  The report is available for download in both French and English here.

MICYN-FP TWG releases tool for developing M&E plans of nutrition and family planning.   The document can be found  here.

Current, Recent and Upcoming Events:

Recent Events

What is good for Nutrition.  December 3, 2014, Save the Children hosted a one-day technical symposium which consisted of in-depth, proactive technical discussions on topics such as how we measure the impact of nutrition programs and the direction of future nutrition programming.  The summary brief is available here.

Future Events

Global Maternal Newborn Health Conference  This meeting has been scheduled for October 18-21,  in Mexico City, Mexico.  Stay tuned for information regarding abstract submissions and be sure to let us know if you do submit, or need assistance submitting.

Call for Evidence and Case studies on Women and Children’s Health  The independent Expert Review Group (iERG) on Information and Accountability for Women’s and Children’s Health is launching its final Calls for Evidence and Case Studies to inform their fourth and final 2015 report. The deadline for abstracts is May 15, 2015.  See these sites for more information:  CALL FOR EVIDENCE  and CALL FOR CASE STUDIES.

Other information to Share?

Contact Lara Hensley with news, updates and/or project results to be included in future posts.

Lara Hensley | IHD MCH Technical Segment - Technical Coordinator | Abt Associates

4550 Montgomery Ave. Ste 800N | Bethesda, MD, 20816

O: 301-347-5335 | M: 301-640-1354  abtassociates.com

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