My Experience With HopeCore’s Maternal and Child Health Program
The HopeCore Maternal and Child Health (MCH) program was launched in March 2015. The program works in four modalities of maternal and child health, education, prevention, treatment, and advice. As a community health officer in this field, I have acquired skills to educate and teach mothers methods of ensuring the proper methods of providing safe and healthy environments for children. I also educate mothers on the proper diet they should provide their growing kids and how this affects their growth and development and impacts disease prevention.
In order to support this project, the health staff of Village HopeCore participates in weekly education sessions. Through these education sessions, my knowledge of health-related topics has grown. After participating in these weekly sessions, I have been successful in sharing my knowledge with other community members in the Maara Sub-County. Through the HopeCore health education sessions that I participate in, I hope to continue to provide for the community and reach higher goals to ensure proper and efficient growth and development of the youngsters in my community.
The maternal and child health project is made up of a number of components, including education, growth monitoring, and a health hotline. Many mothers believe in the myths and more traditional beliefs of the past, and we are combating the reliance on myths by offering special education on safe family planning methods, e.g., implants, IUDs, which are long-term methods, pills, Depo-Provera injections, and female and male condoms. Educating on these family planning methods helps not only married couples but also the youths who might get trapped by unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections.
Another aspect of the clinics is growth monitoring. We weigh and measure children aged 0 to 5 years to check on how they are developing their growth. We advise and educate mothers and caretakers on proper diet to feed their children so as to avoid malnutrition which leads to deficiency diseases. This in return minimizes the total expenditure on hospital bills to treat diseases that can be prevented through proper feeding. The health hotline is another important aspect of our MCH program. We give health hotline numbers to caregivers so that they can access our services through our nurses and access accurate health information related to any questions they may have.
We are aiming at improving and achieving more in each of these points of intervention. Our past achievements are uplifting and empowering me. The neighboring communities are positive and appreciate the services we are delivering, especially those in remote and interior areas of our Sub-County. One of our Community Health Workers, Mercy, helps mothers fill out a survey about their current health behaviors, as well as health education topics and health services they’d like to learn about and receive.