Niger: improving access to services to reduce maternal mortality

Niamey – When 19-yr-in trend Aichatou, from Birni within the Dosso verbalize, stumbled on out she changed into once pregnant together with her first child in 2023, her hope changed into once for a soft being pregnant and salvage start. But she changed into once reluctant to search recommendation from a health centre. “My sisters told me the staff don’t pay enough attention to females in some unspecified time in the future of antenatal checkups, and that the care is mostly slow,” she says. 

Niger continues to face high rates of maternal and neonatal mortality. In 2020, maternal mortality changed into once estimated at 441 deaths per 100 000 dwell births. Neonatal mortality rose from 24 to 43 deaths per 1000 dwell births between 2012 and 2021. In 2021, only 43% of births had been attended by educated health personnel, underlining the pressing want to amplify access to quality care.

In accordance to the 2023 Perinatal Maternal Death Surveillance and Response (PMDSR) file, the leading recount causes of maternal demise in Niger are haemorrhage (34%), hypertensive disorders (28%), infections (24%) and obstructed labour (3%). Whereas these causes are largely preventable, many females proceed to give start at residence, removed from health facilities. That is compounded by low health coverage – correct 55.45% in 2023, according to the 2023 Nationwide Health Recordsdata Machine (SNIS).

In response, the Ministry of Public Health, Inhabitants and Social Affairs, in collaboration with World Health Organisation (WHO) within the African Space and with toughen from the Muskoka Fund, launched the Integrated Very major Obstetric and Neonatal Care Promotion Challenge (SONNE) in 2023. The project, applied by the NGO Action for Effectively-being (APBE), aims to give a raise to maternal and new child health within the Dosso and Zinder regions.

The SONNE project is gripping in four health facilities per verbalize, including two constructed-in health centres, a district clinic, and a mother-and-child health centre. To amplify access, 22 maternal and neonatal health professionals and 100 neighborhood relays were educated. These neighborhood relays, tasked with raising consciousness about reproductive health, especially amongst females of child-bearing age, play a main feature in encouraging antenatal visits. They proceed door-to-door to name pregnant females and inspire them to give start in health facilities, with educated toughen. 

“Prior to the SONNE programme, many females gave start at residence, with out clinical help,” explains Hadiza, a neighborhood relay in Dosso. “Now, I support them to relieve in trend take a look at-u.s.from the starting up of their being pregnant, and to reveal in a health centre. Thanks to consciousness-raising, females are taking more responsibility for their very like health, and that of their young people.”

On fable of these neighborhood efforts, the sequence of females the utilize of maternal services in Dosso’s intervention areas increased by 40% between 2022 and 2023.

“Since receiving the working towards, we have got improved the quality of the care we present. Mothers now search recommendation from more usually, and they’re better immediate in regards to the importance of salvage childbirth,” says Boubacar Halima, head of the Birni Integrated Health Centre. «It’s a shift in mindset that’s paying off; we’re seeing more infants born in accurate health.” 

WHO and its partners proceed to toughen the strengthening of maternal and neonatal health services. Under the SONNE project, health centres were equipped with wanted tools for new child care, comparable to heating tables and kangaroo care wraps, major for stopping hypothermia in premature and low start-weight infants. 

The programme has also presented a maternal and neonatal deaths surveillance map, enabling like a flash reporting, deeper working out of causes, and the implementation of corrective actions to give a raise to care.

“Auditing maternal deaths helps reduce mortality by continuously improving services,” explains Dr Laouali Aissatou, head of the maternal and neonatal health programme at WHO Niger. “With this surveillance map, WHO helps Niger observe mortality traits and refine health policies to assign more lives.”

The SONNE project marks a main step towards better health adore moms and newborns in Niger. Thru quality care, expanded neighborhood consciousness and ongoing monitoring, the programme is already making a existence-saving contrast.

Today, the image is changing. Aichatou, supported by Hadiza, bought prenatal consultations, attentive apply-up and a salvage start. “Each person listened to me,” she says. «I went to all my take a look at-u.s.and it changed into once nothing love what I had been told. The midwives had been form and my start went neatly. I would grunt all pregnant females no longer to give start at residence. With the apt toughen, you enable the health centre feeling nice, with a healthy toddler – and that’s the reason what in actuality matters.”