266240 Community monitoring of children's health by "Sponsor Mothers" in Senegal

Monday, October 29, 2012

Diaguily Koita , Health Program, Plan Senegal, Dakar, Senegal
Ryan Lander, MPH , Field Program Support, Plan International USA, Washington, DC
Plan Senegal implemented a pilot project (2009-11) which consisted of monitoring of children's health through teams composed of mothers at the health hut (health clinic) of Beul Gueye.Each mother was chosen at random as the "sponsor mother" of the biological child of another mother.Each "sponsor" followed her "child" during the various aspects of child growth: vaccination, weighing, nutritional monitoring, disease prevention, personal hygiene, interviews with the birth parents.The village was divided into 4 sections with a group of mothers in each; each quarter, there was a monitoring team of 5 other mothers.The monitoring team of 20 was to oversee the "sponsor mothers" in different aspects: the presence of all mothers at health meetings, collecting monthly contributions of mothers, prevention and proper management of childhood illness, compliance with medical appointments. Monthly, each contributed a certain amount of funds, which was then allocated to “sponsor” mothers whose "children" showed signs of weak health at the the last weighing to use this money to strengthen the nutrition, health and relationship of their "child". At the end of each quarter, the team presented their groups efforts to the whole village, before resigning to make room for another 20 women selected; all women in the village thus were part of the monitoring team at different times.Results: % of fully immunized children, 39% (baseline) to 100%, the proportion of children monthly weighed, 30% (BL) to 100%, ANC visits (four or more), 25% (BL) to 100%; young men have now committed to join the monitoring teams.

Learning Areas:
Program planning
Social and behavioral sciences

Learning Objectives:
(1) Assess if mothers of children under five are the first level of monitoring of children that are in their community (2) Identify scopes for working with community members (other mothers) in intervention and assistance of families whose children appear in need of help

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have played an integral part in the design, implementation and evaluation of the project described in this abstract.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.