Abstract |
Increasing access to safe delivery and family planning services within rural communities increases the opportunities for women to have positive outcomes for their pregnancies as well as to plan and achieve their desired family size. With support from USAID, the Population Council?s Frontiers in Reproductive Health (FRONTIERS) project supported the scaling up of a community-based model in Kenya that enabled women to give birth safely at home or be referred to a hospital when attended by a self-employed skilled midwife living in the community. Originally piloted through a demonstration project implemented by the Population Council with DFID support in Western Province, FRONTIERS assisted the Kenyan Ministry of Health (MOH) to identify an expanded package of safe motherhood services, including postpartum family planning, which could be provided routinely by these „community midwives? living and working from home with minimal supervision and supply of commodities from the MOH. Guidelines and training materials for community midwives were developed and mechanisms for linkages with existing MOH systems at district level strengthened. Four districts (Mount Elgon, Bungoma, Lugari and Butere Mumias) in Western province were selected for scale up of the approach |