The Situation

Globally, every two minutes, a woman dies during pregnancy or childbirth. Every 4.4 seconds a child dies. Malawi has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world with 349 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. Underfive mortality rate is at 41.9 per 1,000 live births.

70% of maternal deaths happen in Sub Saharan Africa
95% of maternal deaths occur in low resource settings
75% of maternal deaths are from severe bleeding, infections, high blood pressure, pregnancy complications, and unsafe abortion.

Majority of these deaths are largely preventable and treatable with access to high-quality and timely healthcare. Poverty is linked to increased maternal and child mortality rates. It is a key hindrance to women's wellbeing especially during pregnancy resulting in malnutrition, anemia, low birth babies or fetal loss.

Delay in accessing maternal and child health services is caused by several barriers that include poor access to health services, insufficient skilled birth attendants, poor quality of care, weak referral systems, long distances, cost and traditional beliefs and practices.These barriers create a ripple effect, leading to poorer health outcomes and greater burden on providers and the community. Unless delays in seeking, reaching and receiving care for reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health services are addressed in Malawi, SDGs 3 will be hard to achieve.

The opportunity

Enough evidence is available on the effectiveness of community-based primary health care in improving outcomes for mothers and children in low resource settings.

However, the challenge lies in reaching the most vulnerable communities, especially the rural populations.

There is widespread consensus that delivering effective primary health care (PHC) interventions through the continuum of care, starting from pregnancy to delivery and then to the newborn, infant, and the young child, is an integral component of health strategies.

The solution

We partner with public health facilities where majority of underserved mothers and newborns receive care from, to address barriers that cause delay in seeking, reaching and receiving care through Proactive Doorstep Care, an affordable and scalable solution.

Our response to maternal and newborn mortality and morbidity is based on an integrated approach that focuses on:

Community engagement
Strengthening the referral system
Building up clinical capacity for quality of care

With this approach Wandikweza aims to support national efforts to achieve SDG 3 and supports targeted districts’ efforts in scaling up evidence based high impact maternal and child health interventions.

We respond to the “Three Delays” that contribute to high perinatal mortality rates by partnering with primary level public health facilities for scale.

Our two main objectives

Address inequalities in maternal and child health outcomes
Strengthen health systems

Delay 1: in decision to seek care due to;

The low status of women
Poor understanding of complications and risk factors in pregnancy and when to seek medical help
Previous poor experience of health care
Acceptance of maternal death
Financial implications
Culture and religion

Delay 2: in reaching care due to;

Distance to health centres and hospitals
Availability of and cost of transportation
Poor roads and infrastructure
Geography e.g. mountainous terrain, rivers

Delay 3: in receiving adequate health care due to;

Poor facilities and lack of medical supplies
Inadequately trained and poorly motivated medical staff
Inadequate referral systems to the next level of care

Discover our approach

Our Values

Prayer

No one can receive anything unless God gives it from heaven (John 3:27). We believe there is no other source than the sovereign will of God

Teamwork

We combine efforts to achieve a common goal. We create a culture that values collaboration and seeks out different perspectives.

Fun through work

We work hard and play hard. We believe it is important to not take ourselves too seriously. We try to have some fun while working.

Excellence

We provide our clients with the high quality health services. We put our whole hearts into the work we do, knowing that what we do matters to God and others.

Transforming maternal and child health care delivery