Sexual|Reproductive Health
Measurement, Learning, and Evaluation for the Ananya Program (Family Health Initiative in Bihar)
In 2010, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation launched the Family Health Initiative in Bihar, India (now named “Ananya”, a Sanskrit word meaning “unique” or “unlike others”). The goals of the Ananya program (2010–2015) are to reduce maternal, newborn, and child mortality; malnutrition; fertility; and morbidity from infectious diseases by developing and implementing innovative and integrated health solutions that involve both the public and private sectors. More specifically, the program aims to expand the reach, coverage, and quality of (1) essential primary health and nutrition services for infants, children, and women of reproductive age; and (2) diagnostic and disease-control services for infectious diseases, including pneumonia, diarrhea, tuberculosis, and visceral leishmaniasis. [68 pages] Read More...
Using Supply- and Demand-Side Strategies to Improve Maternal and Child Health in Bihar, India
This report focuses on the findings from our process study of two early Ananya grants: (1) the Integrated Family Health Initiative (IFHI), led by CARE; and (2) Shaping Demand and Practices to Improve Family Health in Bihar (SDP), led by BBC Media Action. We focused on these two grants because their activities had begun earlier than other grants and had had time to take root. Next, we offer additional detail on the interventions, describe the data collection for the study, and summarize key findings. [120 pages] Read More...
Baseline Findings from the Ananya Evaluation
The Ananya program (ananya is a Sanskrit word meaning “unique” or “unlike others”) was created by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (the foundation) to address some of the important family health challenges in Bihar, one of India’s most populous and poorest states. Ananya started as a five-year program (2011–2015) with the long-term goals of reducing maternal, newborn, and child mortality; fertility; and undernutrition rates in Bihar. To achieve these goals, the foundation is funding a synergistic set of complementary grants focused on improving the reach, coverage, and quality of family health services in two main areas: (1) essential reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health services and (2) diagnosis and treatment of infectious diseases, including pneumonia, diarrhea, tuberculosis, and visceral leishmaniasis. Since its inception, the program has also expanded to include additional interventions that focus on improving sanitation in Bihar and on strengthening the system for health payments, including health-related incentives for households and incentives and payments for frontline health workers. [126 pages] Read More...
ANCP CHIVI WASH Endline Survey Report
Care International in Zimbabwe, in partnership with Chivi Rural District Council (RDC) with funding from Care Australia has been implementing a WASH project termed; “Putting Women and Girls at the center of WASH and Health in Chivi district”. The funding which Care Australia availed to Care Zimbabwe was obtained from the Australian NGO Cooperative programme (ANCP) and other private and charitable organisations including Thank You. The project is hence commonly referred to as the ANCP Chivi WASH Project. The overall goal was to impact two categories of vulnerable women and children namely; (i) Rural and vulnerable girl children between the ages of 10-19 with limited choices and at high risk of early marriage, pregnancies and HIV and AIDS, and (ii) Poor rural women in female headed households unable to fully exercise their rights and residing in areas dependent on agricultural activities. [67 pages] Read More...
Improving Harm Reduction Program in Thailand: An Assessment of the STOP TB and AIDS Through RRTTR (STAR) Program
Thailand continues to experience significant health and social challenges associated with illicit drug use, including injection drug use. Rates of infectious diseases among people who inject drugs (PWID) in Thailand remain high, and access to evidence-based addiction treatments remain low. This is due in part to Thailand’s continued emphasis on drug law enforcement, and the adverse impacts such emphasis has on the delivery of essential healthcare to people who use drugs. At this time, Thailand is also experiencing a growth in non-injection amphetaminetype substance (ATS) use, which has created new challenges. [38 pages] Read More...
Assessment to improve the Harm Reduction Program
Since 2015, Raks Thai Foundation is the PR under the NFM. Under their Stop TB and AIDS through RRTTR (STAR) Programme, the Harm Reduction program is active in 12 provinces, providing 14 dropin centers (DICs), outreach activities, distribution of needles and syringes, information packages and condoms, referral to HIV and STI testing and treatment and other health services and referrals to Methadone maintenance treatment for PWIDs. The service providers are RTF with two DICs, O-Zone with 8 DICs, and Thai Drug Users Network (TDN) with 4 DICs. NSP is only available in the DICs and through outreach of these centers; the number of NSP has been reduced due to the close down of DICs and the termination of partnerships with local pharmacies under the NFM. The number of needles distributed per person per year is 144. According to program data from RTF, the Harm Reduction program is reaching about 7,000-9,000 PWID per year in the 12 provinces or around 16-20% of the national estimate of PWID in need of Harm Reduction services. [29 pages] Read More...
Nepal Earthquake Recovery Response Restoration of Health Facilities with Improved Access to SRMH and WASH Services Baseline Report
The overall objective of this survey was to establish the baseline values on the project indicators as provided in the project logical framework and monitoring and evaluation (M & E) plan. The baseline survey is part of an initial program assessment to inform setting of benchmarks before project intervention that will determine achievements the project’s achievements at the end of the implementation period. The baseline will also provide opportunity to validate design assumptions, updating context information in the target VDCs and inform changes on the design of the project in the logical framework and any necessary alignment on monitoring indicators. Read More...
Support for HIV-Vulnerable Women in Rural Malawi: Economic Empowerment and HIV Prevention
Since January 2010, CARE Malawi has been implementing an HIV Prevention and Economic Empowerment Program with funding from Johnson & Johnson Foundation. The grant piloted and built on lessons that sought to reduce the risk of HIV infection and increase economic empowerment for 1310 women who were assessed to be at highest risk of HIV infection in the rural villages of Lilongwe District in Malawi. CARE hypothesized that integrating HIV prevention and economic empowerment would address economic vulnerabilities to HIV infection and support behavior change. The program was implemented in two phases or economic cycles as follows: (a) Pilot Phase (January to December 2011) covering villages in Traditional Authorities (TA) of Chitekwere, Kalumbu, and Mazengera. An interim evaluation was done in December 2011 at the end of this first economic cycle. (b) Followup Phase (January to December 2013) covering villages in two Traditional Authorities (TA Kalumbu, and TA Mazengera). In 2012 prior to the start of this Phase, the Program expanded to new areas or villages in the two Traditional Authories after dropping out TA Chitekwere’s area. This warranted conducting an Phase II Baseline Survey which was done in March 2013 to establish the situation at the start of the Folloup Phase. 1 Read More...
PCTFI Malawi: FY15 to FY17 Performance Monitoring and Evaluation Plan
The redesigned PCTFI Malawi project takes a holistic approach to adolescent girls’ empowerment with interventions in education and SRH underpinned by cross-cutting activities in gender, participatory governance and capacity building and buoyed by a proactive learning agenda to influence policy at all levels through advocacy. Its goal is to empower adolescent girls in rural Kasungu to claim and exercise their rights to good quality education and sexual and reproductive information and services.
The project strategy leverages six years of PCTFI implementation in Malawi, best practices, lessons learned and proven approaches and tools for the CARE world; and opportunities for collaboration at all levels to map out the pathways to achieving the impact goal. The proposed interventions are organized under 3 thematic areas related to the adolescent girl’s agency and relations and to the structures that influence her empowerment. Read More...
The project strategy leverages six years of PCTFI implementation in Malawi, best practices, lessons learned and proven approaches and tools for the CARE world; and opportunities for collaboration at all levels to map out the pathways to achieving the impact goal. The proposed interventions are organized under 3 thematic areas related to the adolescent girl’s agency and relations and to the structures that influence her empowerment. Read More...
Umodzi Project Midterm Survey Report
The Umodzi Project is a research project, whose aim is to test the effectiveness and scalability of a gender synchronized, transformational approach to accelerate and enhance the impact of integrated adolescent life skills and sexual reproductive health programming. The Umodzi project approach relies on the coordinated action of two existing initiatives to achieve the following outcomes:
➢ Adoption of gender-equitable attitudes and behaviours among adolescent boys and girls in primary school. ➢ Improved health and development knowledge, attitudes, self-efficacy, and self-care practices among adolescent boys and girls in primary school. ➢ Enhanced inter-generational relationships between men and boys and women and girls that are supportive of adolescent gender and SRHR Read More...
➢ Adoption of gender-equitable attitudes and behaviours among adolescent boys and girls in primary school. ➢ Improved health and development knowledge, attitudes, self-efficacy, and self-care practices among adolescent boys and girls in primary school. ➢ Enhanced inter-generational relationships between men and boys and women and girls that are supportive of adolescent gender and SRHR Read More...