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Rwanda Ministry of Health commits to expansion of postabortion care program
– Reported, June 03, 2013
Rwandas Ministry of Health (MOH) and Venture Strategies Innovations (VSI) shared the results of a pilot program that introduced comprehensive care for women who experience complications of unsafe abortion and miscarriage. The partners presented the postabortion care (PAC) program findings and recommendations to nearly 100 attendees, including Ministry of Health officials, health providers from participating districts, and representatives of nongovernmental organizations and United Nations agencies.
Globally, over 47,000 women die due to complications of unsafe abortion each year.
1 Nearly half of all pregnancies are unintended in Rwanda, and almost 30% of women who experience complications from unsafe abortion do not receive needed treatment.
2 To address this public health challenge, with VSIs support the Ministry of Health initiated a comprehensive PAC program to expand treatment services from hospitals only to health centers in four districts for the first time. This pilot program increased womens access to treatment by training nurses at the health center level on the use of misoprostol, a safe and effective medicine that is endorsed as an essential medicine for this use by the World Health Organization.
The initial phase implementation ran from March to October 2012 and was conducted in a total of 50 health centers and five referral hospitals in four diverse districts of Rwanda. At sensitization meetings, community leaders, law enforcement officers and health administrators learned about the dangers of unsafe abortion and the availability of treatment and family planning methods at health centers and subsequently raised awareness about these critical services in their own communities.
Dr. Parfait Uwaliraye, MOH Director General of Planning, officially opened the meeting on behalf of the Honorable Minister of Health, and VSI Vice President of Global Programs Shannon Bledsoe offered welcomed remarks from VSI. Dr. Victor Mivumbi, MOH Maternal Death Audit, shared the meeting objectives with the participants. VSI Associate Medical Director Dr. Nuriye Hodoglugil and MOH PAC Program Focal Person Eugene Kanyamanza presented the programs methodology and the final results with recommendations, respectively. Jean Gakwaya, Health Advisor for DFID in Rwanda, facilitated the day-long meeting.
In addition to the presentation of results and recommendations, Dr. John Muganda, Head of the Obstetrics and Gynecology Department at King Faisal Hospital, introduced the tools and resources developed with VSIs support by the Safe Motherhood Technical Working Group to facilitate national integration of comprehensive PAC services. These include a National Comprehensive PAC Protocol and a PAC Curriculum, including Trainers and Facilitators Guides and a Reference Manual for providers.
To close the meeting, the Ministry of Healths PAC Focal Person Eugene Kanyamanza expressed the Ministrys commitment to the projects expansion.
The Ministry of Health has evidence of success of the program from the results at the pilot sites. Scale-up is already underway to expand PAC services to other districts.
Rwanda is a leader among African countries in introducing effective and feasible medicines like misoprostol to health centers to prevent maternal deaths due to unsafe abortion and miscarriage. Since 2009, VSI has supported the ministries of health in five African countries, including Rwanda, to expand access to postabortion care. Under a grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, VSI will support expansion of this program by training a cadre of providers on manual vacuum aspiration as a complementary treatment method, as well as work to improve awareness of services and postabortion family planning in Gisagara District.
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