The Saving Mothers, Giving Life initiative employed 2 key strategies to improve the ability of pregnant women to reach maternal care: (1) increase the number of emergency obstetric and newborn care facilities, including upgrading existing health facilities, and (2) improve accessibility to such facilities by renovating and constructing maternity waiting homes, improving communication and transportation systems, and supporting community-based savings groups. These interventions can be adapted in low-resource settings to improve access to maternity care services.
The Saving Mothers, Giving Life initiative used 3 coordinated approaches to reduce
maternal deaths resulting from a delay in deciding to seek health care, known as the
“first delay”: (1) promoting safe motherhood messages and facility delivery
using radio, theater, and community engagement; (2) encouraging birth preparedness and
increasing demand for facility delivery through community outreach worker visits; and (3)
providing clean delivery kits and transportation vouchers to reduce financial barriers for
facility delivery. These approaches can be adapted in other low-resource settings to
reduce maternal and perinatal mortality.
Saving Mothers, Giving Life used 6 strategies to address the third delay—receiving adequate health care after reaching a facility—in maternal and newborn health care. The intervention approaches can be adapted in low-resource settings to improve facility-based care and reduce maternal and perinatal mortality.
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