The Effectiveness of a Community Health Worker Program in Sigoti, Kenya

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Date
2013-05-24Author
Kimbrough, Bradly
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Women from the Luo tribe have the highest HIV prevalence of any ethnicity
and gender category in Kenya (22.8%). Due to the high prevalence of HIV, it is
important that these women deliver their infants in health care facilities that
provide antiretroviral treatment as a means to decrease the rate of mother to child
transmission. In addition, the presence of skilled personnel during delivery can
avert between 13 to 33% of maternal deaths. Volunteer community health worker
programs have been created in many developing nations in order to increase the
use of maternal health services. However, the effectiveness of many of these
programs has not been established. The purpose of this study is to examine
whether a community health worker program in Sigoti, Kenya increased the use of
maternal health services from January 2009 through May 2012. Data from the
maternal registry at the Sigoti Health Center was analyzed in order to determine if
utilization rates changed after the institution of the community health worker
program. Data was divided into non‐intervention and intervention time frames for
comparisons. The number of facility‐based deliveries increased from an average of
38 in the non‐intervention time frames to 60 in the intervention time frame. This
increase was statistically significant (p=0.014). However, increases in the risk
profile of the women (p=0.119), the number of HIV‐positive women (p=0.102), and
mean birth weight (p=0.100) were not statistically significant. These findings show
that community health worker programs can be used to increase the number of
facility‐based deliveries. Through such programs, developing nations can
potentially increase the number of pregnant women receiving antiretroviral
treatment and thereby reduce the rate of mother to child transmission of HIV.
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