Project News

The project conducted health worker training on MCHRB introducing nutrition counseling services and respectful care in 11 focus districts since October 2019. Then the project supported the implementation of the 1st Monitoring and Supervision (M&S) in Ashanti Region (reference article: The first Monitoring and Supervision in 11 districts in Ashanti Region). Initially, the project planned to continue the M&S several times as the skills and knowledge gained at the training should be further follow-up with the on-site coaching conducted with M&S. However, the project could not conduct M&S for some time due to the devastating outbreak of COVID-19. The project activities were ceased out from March 2020 to October 2020 as all project experts were forced to return to Japan. The Project resumed its activity in November 2020 and the preparation for the 2nd M&S was taken place.

The project conducted an orientation meeting on the 2nd M&S for selected four districts on 12th February 2021 inviting the district health directors, the district facilitators (the district nutrition officers, the district public health nurses and the district midwives) and regional facilitators who supervise the district facilitators. In the meeting, a regional facilitator presented the results of 1st M&S and the participants discussed challenges and ways forward. Then the Japanese expert explained administrative procedures of the 2nd M&S and the updated checklist. The four districts attended were Adansi Asokwa, Atwima Kwanwoma, Amansie Central and Amansie West. The project plans to pretest the updated checklist in those four districts and later introduce it to the remaining 7 districts. The M&S will be expanded to 11 districts and continue until June 2021.

The results of 1st M&S showed that weight measurement and health education which have been implemented for a long before the project was started were conducted very well. However, the newly introduced measurement skill of height/length of children was weak and needed continuous coaching. 77.5% of the visited health facilities have changed the counseling environment after the training; such as setting designated areas, keeping privacy in the area and using food samples for pregnant women and mothers to understand well. While nutrition counseling was done well, the recording of nutrition counseling was weak. This kind of new skill needs to be followed up with frequent coaching on M&S.

Participants including four district health directors had discussed the countermeasures for the current challenges. They agreed that a pair of a nutrition officer and an RCH officer should conduct M&S as a team; each district should arrange a vehicle with the district health directorate and the project; and M&S team members should fill out the checklist fully. In the 1st M&S, the district facilitators could not spend enough time for mentoring and coaching due to time constraints as they planned to visit too many facilities in a day. From such experiences, the participants agreed that the number of facilities to visit in a day should be less so that the district facilitators can spend more time mentoring and coaching frontline health workers. The participants also agreed that the regional facilitators should join the M&S to support the district facilitators as it has been almost one year since they have conducted the last M&S.

Soon after the meeting, the four district teams submitted the M&S plan to the regional health team and the regional and district teams started 2nd M&S in four districts. The regional facilitators and the project staff plan to review the results of the M&S in those four districts in March. We will make the best use of the 2nd M&S for the better 3rd M&S in full scale in 11 districts.

The regional facilitator is explaining the checklist.