Community health worker perspectives on a new primary health care initiative in the Eastern Cape of South Africa.

BACKGROUND: In 2010, South Africa's National Department of Health launched a national primary health care (PHC) initiative to strengthen health promotion, disease prevention, and early disease detection. The strategy, called Re-engineering Primary Health Care (rPHC), aims to provide a preventive and health-promoting community-based PHC model. A key component of rPHC is the use of community-based outreach teams staffed by generalist community health workers (CHWs). METHODS: We conducted focus group discussions and surveys on the knowledge and attitudes of 91 CHWs working on community-based rPHC teams in the King Sabata Dalindyebo (KSD) sub-district of Eastern Cape Province. RESULTS: The CHWs we studied enjoyed their work and found it meaningful, as they saw themselves as agents of change. They also perceived weaknesses in the implementation of outreach team oversight, and desired field-based training and more supervision in the community. CONCLUSIONS: There is a need to provide CHWs with basic resources like equipment, supplies and transport to improve their acceptability and credibility to the communities they serve.

The promise of Mama Kits: Perceptions of in-kind goods as incentives for facility deliveries in Uganda.

There is growing interest in the use of incentives to increase the utilisation of maternal health services globally, including the use of in-kind goods. As part of the Saving Mothers, Giving Life (SMGL) programme, pregnant women in three districts in Uganda were incentivised to deliver in a facility by the promise of 'Mama Kits' - clean delivery kits augmented with goods for newborns. We collected and analysed qualitative data from 18 focus groups (130 women) who had a recent home (N = 9) or facility delivery (N = 9 groups) to understand their overall perceptions of the SMGL programme, and, in particular, the Mama Kit. There was a high level of awareness of Mama Kits among women who delivered in a health facility and a moderate awareness among women who delivered at home. When available, kits positively affected women's perceptions of facility delivery because they associated availability of kits with affordability of care. When not available, women's perceptions of their actual or expected delivery experience were negatively affected. When well implemented, in-kind goods can be important complements in broader efforts to incentivise facility delivery. Inconsistent implementation and an underestimation of their influence on care-seeking can undermine efforts to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity.

Local adaptations to a global health initiative: penalties for home births in Zambia.

Global health initiatives (GHIs) are implemented across a variety of geographies and cultures. Those targeting maternal health often prioritise increasing facility delivery rates. Pressure on local implementers to meet GHI goals may lead to unintended programme features that could negatively impact women. This study investigates penalties for home births imposed by traditional leaders on women during the implementation of Saving Mothers, Giving Life (SMGL) in Zambia. Forty focus group discussions (FGDs) were conducted across four rural districts to assess community experiences of SMGL at the conclusion of its first year. Participants included women who recently delivered at home (3 FGDs/district), women who recently delivered in a health facility (3 FGDs/district), community health workers (2 FGDs/district) and local leaders (2 FGDs/district). Findings indicate that community leaders in some districts-independently of formal programme directive-used fines to penalise women who delivered at home rather than in a facility. Participants in nearly all focus groups reported hearing about the imposition of penalties following programme implementation. Some women reported experiencing penalties firsthand, including cash and livestock fines, or fees for child health cards that are typically free. Many women who delivered at home reported their intention to deliver in a facility in the future to avoid penalties. While communities largely supported the use of penalties to promote facility delivery, the penalties effectively introduced a new tax on poor rural women and may have deterred their utilization of postnatal and child health care services. The imposition of penalties is thus a punitive adaptation that can impose new financial burdens on vulnerable women and contribute to widening health, economic and gender inequities in communities. Health initiatives that aim to increase demand for health services should monitor local efforts to achieve programme targets in order to better understand their impact on communities and on overall programme goals.

Narrative Methods and Sociocultural Linguistic Approaches in Facilitating In-depth Understanding of HIV Disclosure in a Cohort of Women and Men in Cape Town, South Africa.

The South African National Department of Health has rapidly extended free public-sector antiretroviral treatment for people living with HIV from 2007. Approximately 6 million people are living with HIV in South Africa, with 3.1 million currently on treatment. HIV disclosure stigma has been reduced in high prevalence, generalized epidemic settings, but some remains, including in research interviews. This paper documents the unexpected reactions of people living with HIV to interviewers. It highlights shifts over time from discussing daily events with researchers to later expressing distress and then relief at having an uninvolved, sympathetic person with whom to discuss HIV disclosure. While there are commonalities, women and men had gendered responses to interviewers. These are apparent in men's uncharacteristic emotional responses and women's shyness in revealing gendered aspects of HIV acquisition. Both women and men expressed stress at not being allowed or able to fulfill dominant expected masculine or feminine roles. The findings underline the role of research interviewers in study participants confiding and fully expressing their feelings. This greater confidence occurred in follow-up interviews with researchers in busy health facilities, where time of health-care providers is limited. It underlines the methodological value of narrative inquiries with research cohorts. These allowed richer data than cross-sectional interviews. They shaped the questions asked and the process of interview. They revealed participants' increasing level of agency in expressing feelings that they find important. This research contributes to highlighting pivotal, relational aspects in research between empathetic, experienced researchers and study participants and how participant-researcher relationships progress over time. It highlights ethical dilemmas in roles of researchers as opposed to counselors, raising questions of possible blurring of lines between research and service roles. This requires further research exploration. It additionally underscores the importance of "care for the carer." Furthermore, it emphasizes that cultural sensitivity to language involves more than merely speaking the words in a language. Culture, humor, dialects, conceptual issues, wordplay, common sense, and respectful attitudes to other languages, resonates.

Evaluation Of A Maternal Health Program In Uganda And Zambia Finds Mixed Results On Quality Of Care And Satisfaction.

Saving Mothers, Giving Life is a multidonor program designed to reduce maternal mortality in Uganda and Zambia. We used a quasi-random research design to evaluate its effects on provider obstetric knowledge, clinical confidence, and job satisfaction, and on patients' receipt of services, perceived quality, and satisfaction. Study participants were 1,267 health workers and 2,488 female patients. Providers' knowledge was significantly higher in Ugandan and Zambian intervention districts than in comparison districts, and in Uganda there were similar positive differences for providers' clinical confidence and job satisfaction. Patients in Ugandan intervention facilities were more likely to give high ratings for equipment availability, providers' knowledge and communication skills, and care quality, among other factors, than patients in comparison facilities. There were fewer differences between Zambian intervention and comparison facilities. Country differences likely reflect differing intensity of program implementation and the more favorable geography of intervention districts in Uganda than in Zambia. National investments in the health system and provider training and the identification of intervention components most associated with improved performance will be required for scaling up and sustaining the program.

Factors influencing modes of transport and travel time for obstetric care: a mixed methods study in Zambia and Uganda.

Transportation is an important barrier to accessing obstetric care for many pregnant and postpartum women in low-resource settings, particularly in rural areas. However, little is known about how pregnant women travel to health facilities in these settings. We conducted 1633 exit surveys with women who had a recent facility delivery and 48 focus group discussions with women who had either a home or a facility birth in the past year in eight districts in Uganda and Zambia. Quantitative data were analysed using univariate statistics, and qualitative data were analysed using thematic content analysis techniques. On average, women spent 62-68 min travelling to a clinic for delivery. Very different patterns in modes of transport were observed in the two countries: 91% of Ugandan women employed motorized forms of transportation, while only 57% of women in Zambia did. Motorcycle taxis were the most commonly used in Uganda, while cars, trucks and taxis were the most commonly used mode of transportation in Zambia. Lower-income women were less likely to use motorized modes of transportation: in Zambia, women in the poorest quintile took 94 min to travel to a health facility, compared with 34 for the wealthiest quintile; this difference between quintiles was ∼50 min in Uganda. Focus group discussions confirmed that transport is a major challenge due to a number of factors we categorized as the 'three A's:' affordability, accessibility and adequacy of transport options. Women reported that all of these factors had influenced their decision not to deliver in a health facility. The two countries had markedly different patterns of transportation for obstetric care, and modes of transport and travel times varied dramatically by wealth quintile, which policymakers need to take into account when designing obstetric transport interventions.

'Big push' to reduce maternal mortality in Uganda and Zambia enhanced health systems but lacked a sustainability plan.

In the past decade, "big push" global health initiatives financed by international donors have aimed to rapidly reach ambitious health targets in low-income countries. The health system impacts of these efforts are infrequently assessed. Saving Mothers, Giving Life is a global public-private partnership that aims to reduce maternal mortality dramatically in one year in eight districts in Uganda and Zambia. We evaluated the first six to twelve months of the program's implementation, its ownership by national ministries of health, and its effects on health systems. The project's impact on maternal mortality is not reported here. We found that the Saving Mothers, Giving Life initiative delivered a large "dose" of intervention quickly by capitalizing on existing US international health assistance platforms, such as the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. Early benefits to the broader health system included greater policy attention to maternal and child health, new health care infrastructure, and new models for collaborating with the private sector and communities. However, the rapid pace, external design, and lack of a long-term financing plan hindered integration into the health system and local ownership. Sustaining and scaling up early gains of similar big push initiatives requires longer-term commitments and a clear plan for transition to national control.