Facilitative supervision for improving quality of FP/RH services

Project Purpose: ACQUIRE focuses on developing, validating, adapting or replicating tools, models, and approaches to increase access to and quality of facility-based FP/RH services. Based on quality management principles, facilitative supervision (FS) is an approach that emphasizes mentoring, joint problem solving, and two-way communication between supervisors and supervisees. The newly-developed Facilitative Supervision curriculum focuses on the role of supervisors in ensuring the fundamentals of care for facility-based services. Training helps to develop an understanding of roles of supervisors in supporting quality services by linking the supervisory system with other service delivery systems and building leadership, communication, and facilitation skills in supervisors.

Information used: ACQUIRE developed tools to evaluate the impact of FS training on supervisory system. Information will be collected to evaluate to what extent have supervisors incorporated FS concepts into their supervision practice, what organizational and other changes have been made in the supervision system and in service delivery.

Methods used: ACQUIRE trained trainers to roll-out FS training. Monitoring and data will be collected regularly following training to assess the effectiveness of this approach.

Major results: The project is in progress and evaluation results are not yet available. Preliminary results from Bangladesh demonstrated changes in organization of services and improved provider and client satisfaction.

Policy implications: It is expected that this approach will have important implications on supervisory systems through the development and implementation of supervisory guidelines and tools for assessing service quality. A strengthened supervisory system will improve the operation of other systems involved in service provision.