More articles from ORIGINAL ARTICLES
- Reducing child global undernutrition at scale in Sofala Province, Mozambique, using Care Group Volunteers to communicate health messages to mothers
Care Group peer-to-peer behavior change communication improved child undernutrition at scale in rural Mozambique and has the potential to substantially reduce under-5 mortality in priority countries at very low cost.
- Meeting the community halfway to reduce maternal deaths? Evidence from a community-based maternal death review in Uttar Pradesh, India
Even in the face of vigorous commitment to improving maternal health services in India, inadequate staffing, supplies, and equipment at health facilities, as well as transportation costs and delays in referral, appear to contribute to a substantial proportion of maternal deaths in a representative district in Uttar Pradesh.
- Women's growing desire to limit births in sub-Saharan Africa: meeting the challenge
Contrary to conventional wisdom, many sub-Saharan African women—often at young ages—have an unmet need for family planning to limit future births, and many current limiters do not use the most effective contraceptive methods. Family planning programs must improve access to a wide range of modern contraceptive methods and address attitudinal and knowledge barriers if they are to meet women's needs.
- Effectiveness of a community-based positive prevention intervention for people living with HIV who are not receiving antiretroviral treatment: a prospective cohort study
In Mombasa, Kenya, a community-based HIV risk-reduction intervention effectively reached people living with HIV who were not receiving antiretroviral treatment (ART)—a difficult-to-reach population because they often fall outside the ambit of health care services—and succeeded in reducing reported risky sex behavior and increasing ART uptake.
- Successful polio eradication in Uttar Pradesh, India: the pivotal contribution of the Social Mobilization Network, an NGO/UNICEF collaboration
Innovative approaches to eradicate polio in hard-to-reach areas included: (1) cadres of trusted community mobilizers who track children's immunization status, (2) responsiveness to people's concerns about immunization, (3) outreach to religious and other local leaders, (4) focus on both individual- and community-level behavioral approaches, and (5) continuous data collection and use.
- Lessons learned from scaling up a community-based health program in the Upper East Region of northern Ghana
The original CHPS model deployed nurses to the community and engaged local leaders, reducing child mortality and fertility substantially. Key scaling-up lessons: (1) place nurses in home districts but not home villages, (2) adapt uniquely to each district, (3) mobilize local resources, (4) develop a shared project vision, and (5) conduct “exchanges” so that staff who are initiating operations can observe the model working in another setting, pilot the approach locally, and expand based on lessons learned.
- “Man, what took you so long?” Social and individual factors affecting adult attendance at voluntary medical male circumcision services in Tanzania
In a study in Tanzania, men and women generally supported male circumcision; however, cultural values that the procedure is most appropriate before adolescence, shame associated with being circumcised at an older age, and concerns about the post-surgical abstinence period have led to low uptake among older men.