DEL2ALL Project: Society For Family Health Trains Over 350 Health Workers in Kaduna State
… Treats 11,975 cases of Malaria, 1,007 cases of Pneumonia, 7,585 cases of Diarrhoea in Children Under 5
Zainab Tanimu
Kaduna, Northwest, Nigeria
Society For Family Health (SFH) in fulfilment of its pursuit to provide intervention in building the capacity of Patients and Proprietary Medicine Vendors (PPMV) has successfully completed it’s project in Kaduna state.
This was achieved through training and mentorship of health workers in order that they can provide timely treatment for pneumonia, malaria and darrhoea in children under five.
The Managing Director, SFH, Dr. Omokhudu Idogho disclosed this while delivery his speech at the event.
Society For Family Health is a Nigerian non-governmental organization (NGO) working with communities, government donors and Private sectors for universal health coverage and social justice for all Nigerians.
SFH he said uses health system strengthening and market development approaches striving to unify the private and public sector to scale an Essential Package of Health Services (EPHS) offering of good quality to all Nigerians.
SFH is collaborating with all states of the federation, including Kaduna state to achieve it’s laudable objectives. He stated.
Fielding questions from journalists, Dr. Omokhudu expressed satisfaction with the implementation and interventions of the programme.
The programme he said was designed in line with the Federal Ministry of Health( FMOH) integrated Community Case Management of Childhood illness (iCCM) strategy to improve the health and reduce the unacceptable high mortality rate in children under the age of five years in the state.
The SFH he added has through its Delivering Health to all Children Project ( DEL2ALL) strengthened it’s referral chain between the public and private health sector within the state and trained over 350 health workers.
It has also diagnosed 13,216 children with Fever and RDT (+) out of which 11,975 children were treated with Artemisinin-based combination therapy.
Not only that, through the project,they were able to intervene in 3,773 cases of Pneumonia in CU5 and treated 1, 007 cases of uncomplicated pneumonia.
So also, they intervened in 8,522 cases of Diarrhoea in the state and 7, 585 were treated.
“SFH will like to assure the good people of Kaduna state that we will continue to do our best to serve the state and the country at large.” He said.
Dr. Omokhudu thanked the Governor of Kaduna state, Mallam Nasir Ahmad el-rufai, the Honorable Commissioner of Health, Dr. Amina, Mohammed-Baloni, their donors and everyone that contributed in making their project a success.
Throwing more light on the programme, the Head, Project Support Unit, Society for Family Health, Pharm. Adizue Jane explained that the project is being implemented in two states of Nigeria.
Within Kaduna, it is implemented in 2LGAs, so also in Ebonyi state.
The success of the programme will minimize child morbidity rate in Nigeria as adequate training of care-givers and ensuring equity in services is ensured.
“Our area of focus is the integrated childhood diseases and management strategies and what we are doing is see how we can reduce morbidity and mortality of children under five in the areas of Malaria, Pneumonia and darrhoea. So we built the capacities of the PPMVs to be able to deliver service on uncomplicated Malaria and Diarrhea, then do referral when cases require higher level of care.” She explained.
Still on the SFH ‘s activities, Mr Denis Aiziobo and Mr Nelson Nwankwo both of the Society for Family Health, narrated some of the experiences encountered in the course of their jobs.
According to Mr Denis there were successes and challenges recorded.
The successes being that of cooperation enjoyed from the community leaders, religious leaders and community members themselves who helped in facilitating their job.
“While we engaged in stakeholders engagement and collaboration, we also carried out community mobilization to create awareness. We used community leaders, religious leaders and community members to strengthen and improve health services. We also used them in terms of challenges to receive the necessary supports we needed.
We also used the opportunity to do some data collections which are evidence based.” He stated.
Mr Nelson expatiating on their activities said,
“PPMV involvement during outreaches brought about more commitments and results.
The use of canvassers for data review enhanced the quality of data.
Explaining further, he said the strategies used in recording successes were in three folds.
“The One -,on-One outreach method,
The group discussion method and that of community outreaches where canvassers are used.
The month of February-March he said was when they had the highest record of success as family activities were on the low side.
Part of their challenges was, affordability of services affected referrals.”
Contributing, the representative of the Federal Ministry of Health,, Mr. Adama Abdul commended SFH for a job well done. The training he said will further enhance the knowledge of the PPMVs.
According to him, there is need for sustainability of the project and therefore urged that members of the community be more involved for the programme to succeed.
” From the testimonies and success stories given by some of the canvassers and community leaders, l must admit that the programme has been impactful.
“However, l would like to urge that as a way forward, they should go in line with sustainability plan. Making sure that the communities are involved in the appropriate way and making sure that the success story continues because the issue of treating children without carrying out a test has been a big challenge in this country.”
Director Primary Health Care, Family and Community Health Services, Kaduna state, Dr. Ko lliyasu sees the SFH programme as going to boost the quality of health care in the state.
Similar projects he said were sponsored by some bodies but that these additional training and skills acquired by these PPMVs will help in providing quality services to the people particularly the hard – to-reach areas.
“This Programme is a good one. The state have been providing similar services in the public sector. UNICEF supported such programmes in ten local government areas with hard – to – reach communities. Though UNICEF came and gone overnight, and now this project. So, we have seen what it looks like in the public, we have seen what it looks like in the private even though that of the public is still on – going. There is need to bring the two together and ensure that the hard-to – reach does not suffer unduly because they don’t have facilities. “
The government is doing it’s best to see that in every ward there is primary health care facility to provide services to the people. He said.
Dr. Iliyasu had assured government’s commitments in bringing health services closer to the people.
“We have renovated and we are building more facilities in different wards, we are building 33 PHC centers in 33 wards, all to see that assess to these facilities are increased”.
The contributory health Scheme is also there though poor assess due to financial constrain. That government is looking into it. He added.
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The Assistant Director, Pharmacy Council of Nigeria Abuja, Pharm. Usman in his own commendation thanked the SFH for the opportunity given to quite a number of its members to upgrade their knowledge. The training he said has exposed them to skills on how to go about handling their patients.
“It is a successful project. It has offered opportunity to train the PPMVs who are the real stakeholders of pharmacy council of Nigeria to be able to have elementary training and making referrals to higher health services. Also, pharmacists and staff have the opportunity to be trained alongside the PPMVs in the course of the project from last year December to date. We appreciate the SFH and all the donor agents for their good intention.
“Before this time, our challenges have been on how to undertake the training on these child killer diseases and making referrals to higher health services but with this now, at least some people have been trained though out of thousands that we have on data based. These people will try and train others on how to handle some elementary treatments based on Malaria, Pneumonia and Darrhoea.”
Usman promised its Council’s willingness to step down what they have acquired in other to benefit others. He however called on the need for donor agencies to work with ministry of health and relevant stakeholders to further enhance the sector.
Alhaji Mohammed Kabir Usman, Miyyetti Allah Rigasa speaking on behalf of the community leaders thanked Society for Family Health for their good job.
He pledged the cooperation of the community leaders in the smooth dispensation of their project within Kaduna communities. The project is to their own advantage, he acknowledged.
Earlier, the Project Coordinator, Society for Family Health, Blessing Oko, while welcoming participants charged them to remain committed to the course in order to enhance the success as well as benefit from the gains of the project.
The DEL2ALL Project is funded by Novartis Foundation and implemented by Society for Family Health.
