Quality of newborn care: a health facility assessment in rural Ghana using survey, vignette and surveillance data

Abstract Introduction Nepal has pledged to substantially reduce maternal and newborn death by 2030. Improving quality of intrapartum health services will be vital to reduce these deaths. This paper examines quality of delivery and newborn services in health facilities of Nepal. Methods Data were sourced from the Nepal Health Facility Survey 2015, which covered a national representative sample of health facilities. The datasets were analysed to assess service readiness, availability and quality of delivery and newborn care in a sample of 992 health facilities. Results Of the 992 facilities in the sample, 623 provided delivery and newborn care services. Of the 623 facilities offering delivery and newborn care services, 13.3% offered comprehensive emergency obstetric care (CEmONC), 19.6% provided basic emergency obstetric care (BEmONC) and 53.9% provided basic delivery and newborn service. The availability of essential equipment for delivery and newborn care was more than 80% in health facilities. Except for the coverage of vitamin K injection, the coverage of immediate newborn care was more than 85% in all health facilities. The coverage of use of chlorhexidine ointment to all newborns was more than 70% in government hospitals and primary health care centers (PHCCs) and only 32.3% in private hospitals. Conclusions These findings show gaps in equipment and drugs, especially in PHCCs and private health facilities. Improving readiness and availability of equipment and drugs in PHCCs and private health facility will help improve the quality of care to further reduce maternal and newborn mortality in Nepal.

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Assessment of Health Facilities Delivering HIV Services among Patients in Bonny, South-South Nigeria

International STD Research & Reviews ◽

10.9734/isrr/2019/v8i230099 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 1-11

Author(s):

A. J. Onoja ◽

O. N. Akoma

Keyword(s):

Quality Of Care ◽

Health Facility ◽

Health Centre ◽

Health Facilities ◽

Hiv And Aids ◽

Health Concern ◽

Facility Assessment ◽

The Impact ◽

Hiv Aids

Background: The growing spread of HIV and AIDS among the people of Bonny Kingdom and capacity of medical facilities and service providers to respond to the dire situation have long posed public health concern of immeasurable proportion right from the inception of the Ibani-Se HIV/AIDS Baseline Survey Initiative in 2006 to the implementation of a three-year (2008-2011) intervention programme and thereafter. The impact of the provision of ART and other medical services related to HIV on the quality of care and satisfaction of all, HIV and non-HIV patients is unknown, and any available evidence is limited and arguable. The survey sought to know the number of health facility in the locality, the services they offer and most importantly the number of qualified personnel in such health facilities. Methods: A standardized questionnaire was designed for facility assessment to measure the capacity of health facilities to undertake VCT and ART services. The survey was conducted in sixteen (16) health facilities; fourteen (14) public and two (2) private health facilities located within Bonny town and in the creeks. In each facility, the manager and health providers were surveyed, with at least one provider selected from the HIV/AIDS department; 10 randomly selected persons in the Outpatients Department/Unit including 5 from the HIV/AIDS services were interviewed. A standard health facility assessment checklist was developed to measure the quality of care, capacity of providers, developmental and training needs. Others included conformity to standard of practice and quality of medical equipment. Data was entered with Census and Survey Processing System (CSPro) and exported to SPSS or Stata for analysis. Results: Of the sixteen health facilities, only seven provided both VCT and PMTCT services (Abalamabia health centre, Comprehensive health centre, NLNG RA Hospital, General Hospital, Finima health centre, Good shepherd Health medical lab and Chanel clinic) while one (Island Medical lab) provided VCT services; the others provided neither of the two services. Although, there are fairly adequate number and distribution of health facilities in the LGA, utilization of the general health services was found to have improved when compared to the previous survey. However, lack of structured unit for the provision of VCT and PMTCT services, specifically trained and designated counselors; and poorly motivated public healthcare providers have given rise to concerns about poor access of rural dwellers and inequitable distribution of the few available services, particularly to people most in need. Conclusion: Implications of this survey were highlighted for a more effective HIV prevention and control programme for wide coverage.

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Neonatal near miss: a potentially useful approach to assess quality of newborn care

Jornal de Pediatria ◽

10.2223/jped.1978 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 86 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Lale Say

Keyword(s):

Newborn Care ◽

Near Miss ◽

Assess Quality ◽

Neonatal Near Miss

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Understanding what women want: eliciting preference for delivery health facility in a rural subcounty in Kenya, a discrete choice experiment

BMJ Open ◽

10.1136/bmjopen-2020-038865 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (12) ◽

pp. e038865

Author(s):

Jackline Oluoch-Aridi ◽

Mary B Adam ◽

Francis Wafula ◽

Gilbert Kokwaro

Keyword(s):

Quality Of Care ◽

Health Facility ◽

Discrete Choice Experiment ◽

Discrete Choice ◽

Choice Experiment ◽

Home Delivery ◽

Process Indicator ◽

Opt Out ◽

Women’S Preferences

ObjectiveTo identify what women want in a delivery health facility and how they rank the attributes that influence the choice of a place of delivery.DesignA discrete choice experiment (DCE) was conducted to elicit rural women’s preferences for choice of delivery health facility. Data were analysed using a conditional logit model to evaluate the relative importance of the selected attributes. A mixed multinomial model evaluated how interactions with sociodemographic variables influence the choice of the selected attributes.SettingSix health facilities in a rural subcounty.ParticipantsWomen aged 18–49 years who had delivered within 6 weeks.Primary outcomeThe DCE required women to select from hypothetical health facility A or B or opt-out alternative.ResultsA total of 474 participants were sampled, 466 participants completed the survey (response rate 98%). The attribute with the strongest association with health facility preference was having a kind and supportive healthcare worker (β=1.184, p<0.001), second availability of medical equipment and drug supplies (β=1.073, p<0.001) and third quality of clinical services (β=0.826, p<0.001). Distance, availability of referral services and costs were ranked fourth, fifth and sixth, respectively (β=0.457, p<0.001; β=0.266, p<0.001; and β=0.000018, p<0.001). The opt-out alternative ranked last suggesting a disutility for home delivery (β=−0.849, p<0.001).ConclusionThe most highly valued attribute was a process indicator of quality of care followed by technical indicators. Policymakers need to consider women’s preferences to inform strategies that are person centred and lead to improvements in quality of care during delivery.

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Sterilization regret in India: Is quality of care a matter of concern?

Contraception and Reproductive Medicine ◽

10.1186/s40834-020-00115-8 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 5 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Anjali Bansal ◽

Laxmi Kant Dwivedi

Keyword(s):

Quality Of Care ◽

Family Planning ◽

Health Facility ◽

Fold Increase ◽

Well Being ◽

Poor Quality ◽

Public Health Facility ◽

The Family ◽

Planning Methods

Abstract Background According to United Nations, 19% of females in the world relied only on the permanent method of family planning, with 37% in India according to NFHS-4. Limited studies tried to measure the sterilization regret, and its correlated factors. The study tried to explore the trend of sterilization regret in India from 1992 to 2015 and to elicit the determining effects of various factors on sterilization regret, especially in context to perceived quality of care in the sterilization operations and type of providers. Data and methods The pooled data from NFHS-1, NFHS-3 and NFHS-4 was used to explore the regret by creating interaction between time and all the predictors. Predicted probabilities were calculated to show the trend of sterilization regret amounting to quality of care, type of health provider at the three time periods. Results The sterilization regret was increased from 5 % in NFHS-1 to 7 % in NFHS-4. According to NFHS-4, for those whose sterilization was performed in private health facility the regret was found to be less (OR-0.937; 95% CI- (0.882–0.996)) compared to public health facility. Also, the results show a two-fold increase in regret when women reported bad quality of care. The results from predicted probabilities provide enough evidence that the regret due to bad quality of care in sterilization operation had increased with each subsequent round of NFHS. Conclusion Many socio-economic and demographic factors have influenced the regret, but the poor quality of care contributed maximum to the regret from 1992 to 2015. The health facilities have seriously strayed from improving the health and well-being of women in providing the family planning methods. In addition, to public facilities, the regret amounting to private facilities have also increased from NFHS-1 to 4. The quality of care provided in the family planning operation should be standardized in every hospital to strengthen the health systems in the country. The couple should be motivated to adopt more of spacing methods.

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Measuring oxygen access: lessons from health facility assessments in Lagos, Nigeria

BMJ Global Health ◽

10.1136/bmjgh-2021-006069 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 6 (8) ◽

pp. e006069

Author(s):

Hamish R Graham ◽

Omotayo E Olojede ◽

Ayobami A Bakare ◽

Agnese Iuliano ◽

Oyaniyi Olatunde ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Health Facility ◽

Point Of Care ◽

Assessment Tools ◽

Operating Theatre ◽

Facility Assessment ◽

Primary Health ◽

Primary Health Centres ◽

Health Centres ◽

The Cost

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted global oxygen system deficiencies and revealed gaps in how we understand and measure ‘oxygen access’. We present a case study on oxygen access from 58 health facilities in Lagos state, Nigeria. We found large differences in oxygen access between facilities (primary vs secondary, government vs private) and describe three key domains to consider when measuring oxygen access: availability, cost, use. Of 58 facilities surveyed, 8 (14%) of facilities had a functional pulse oximeter. Oximeters (N=27) were typically located in outpatient clinics (12/27, 44%), paediatric ward (6/27, 22%) or operating theatre (4/27, 15%). 34/58 (59%) facilities had a functional source of oxygen available on the day of inspection, of which 31 (91%) facilities had it available in a single ward area, typically the operating theatre or maternity ward. Oxygen services were free to patients at primary health centres, when available, but expensive in hospitals and private facilities, with the median cost for 2 days oxygen 13 000 (US$36) and 27 500 (US$77) Naira, respectively. We obtained limited data on the cost of oxygen services to facilities. Pulse oximetry use was low in secondary care facilities (32%, 21/65 patients had SpO2 documented) and negligible in private facilities (2%, 3/177) and primary health centres (<1%, 2/608). We were unable to determine the proportion of hypoxaemic patients who received oxygen therapy with available data. However, triangulation of existing data suggested that no facilities were equipped to meet minimum oxygen demands. We highlight the importance of a multifaceted approach to measuring oxygen access that assesses access at the point-of-care and ideally at the patient-level. We propose standard metrics to report oxygen access and describe how these can be integrated into routine health information systems and existing health facility assessment tools.

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Higher rates of early initiation of breastfeeding associated with health facility delivery in Nepal

European Journal of Public Health ◽

10.1093/eurpub/ckaa165.1121 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 30 (Supplement_5) ◽

Author(s):

D Dharel ◽

A Bhattarai ◽

Y R Paudel ◽

P Acharya ◽

K Acharya

Keyword(s):

Health Facility ◽

Newborn Care ◽

Facility Delivery ◽

Early Initiation ◽

Health Facility Delivery ◽

Essential Newborn Care ◽

Place Of Delivery ◽

Early Initiation Of Breastfeeding ◽

Nationally Representative ◽

Initiation Of Breastfeeding

Abstract Background Initiation of breastfeeding within one hour from birth is one of the five key essential newborn care messages, implemented along with birth preparedness package since 2008. This study aimed to determine the trend of early initiation of breastfeeding (EIBF) and to assess the effect of health facility delivery on EIBF in Nepal. Methods We analyzed the data from the last four nationally representative Nepal Demographic and Health Surveys (NDHS) conducted in 2001,2006,2011 and 2016. Data on the early initiation of breastfeeding was obtained from the mothers of infants born within 24 months prior to the survey. The explanatory variable was the place of delivery, dichotomized as either the health facility, or home delivery. Survey year had a significant interaction with the place of delivery. Multivariable logistic regression was conducted separately on pooled samples before (NDHS 2001 and 2006) and after (NDHS 2011 and 2016) the program implementation. Adjusted odds ratio (AOR) with 95% confidence interval (CI) for EIBF was calculated after adjusting for predetermined covariates. Results The rate of EIBF increased by 26.5% points (from 32.8% in 2001 to 59.3% in 2016) among infants delivered in a health facility, compared to an increase by 17.1% points (from 29.9% to 47.0%) among home born infants. EIBF increased by 32.5% points before, compared to 49.7% points after BPP. Delivery in a health facility was associated with a higher odd of EIBF in later years (AOR2.3, 95% CI 2.0,2.8), but not in earlier years (AOR1.3, 95% CI 0.9,2.0). Delivery by caesarean section, first-born infant, and lack of maternal education were associated with a lower rate of EIBF in both periods. Conclusions Higher EIBF was associated with health facility delivery in Nepal, only after programmatic emphasis on essential newborn care messages. This implies the need for explicit focus on EIBF at birth, particularly when mother is less educated, primiparous or undergoing operative delivery. Key messages The rate of initiation of breastfeeding within an hour from birth is increasing in Nepal, with higher rates in health facility delivery, as shown by the recent four nationally representative surveys. Programmatic focus on essential newborn care messages may have contributed to significant association of higher rates of early initiation of breastfeeding when delivered in health facility.

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