The Rotary Foundation under its Together for Healthy Families program is convening a 3-day workshop to train stakeholders on Community Maternal Perinatal Child Death Surveillance and Response (CMPDSR).
Speaking during the workshop held in Abuja on Monday, the National Coordinator, Rotary Action Group for Reproductive Maternal and Child Health (RMCH) Nigeria, Prof. Emmanuel Lufadeju stated that Nigeria continues to grapple with one of the highest maternal mortality ratios in the world.
“Behind these statistics are real women, mothers, daughters and sisters who deserve our care and compassion. This meeting marks a critical step in our collective journey to reverse this trend.
“Over the next 2 days, we will engage in robust discussions, share expertise and chart a course for action. Our objective is clear: to reduce maternal deaths in our community through sustainable, community-led initiatives.
“We would explore strategies for improving access to quality antenatal care, strengthening referral systems and promoting community based interventions”, he said.
Prof. Lufadeju also explained that Community Maternal Perinatal Child Death Surveillance and Response (CMPDSR) was a way of quantifying, assessing how many women die at home during childbirth, how to report it, review it, determine the cause of death, and give feedback to the community on ways of preventing it from recurring.
He said the training was for MPDSR chairmen at the state level, the Monitoring and Evaluation officers at the local government level, the Doctor in charge at the local government level, Reproductive Health Coordinators at the local government and the state, Market women among others
On her part, the Executive Secretary, FCT Primary Health Care Board, Dr. Ruqayya Wamakko said the actual number of mothers and children dying in Nigeria could not be ascertained from hospital records alone:
“We realize that the community needs to be involved because the death that is occurring in the facility, in the primary health care facility, secondary facility or tertiary facility, will not give us the exact number of deaths that we are having. And then knowing how to reduce them without involving the community. Because we realize that women also died in the community.
“Children also died in the community. But we don’t have the data and who is accountable for it? What is the issue behind that death when it occurs? So, we are now gathering and bringing all the community stakeholders together with the facility health workers because in every community there is a nearby primary health care facility and also a zonal secondary facility around them.
“So, we bring them all together with the M&Es, that is monitoring and evaluation officers, to train them on how to survey the death that occurs in the community, be it for the mother or for the newborn baby or for a child, so that we can have a holistic approach’, she said.
Oh his part, one of the participants, Prince Mustapha said the training was an eye opener. “This is the first time that I will be taught of the need to take records of child deaths in my community and environment.
“We never knew that it is very important for us to do that. But after the first training and experience, I got to know that yes, it is very important for us to know the cause or to know the numbers of child deaths.
Because if you don’t know, you might not even project or treat that as important.
“But Rotary has brought to my knowledge and to others that it is very important for us to take records of child deaths in our community. Because of that factor, I will say like I have been saying before, thank you Rotary”, he said.
