Maternal Health

Increasing Access to Healthcare Services for Women at Risk

According to the World Health Organization, hundreds of women die from pregnancy or childbirth-related complications around the world every day. Almost all of these maternal deaths occur in low-resource settings, and most could have been prevented.

CMMB works in countries with the highest maternal mortality rates in Africa and the Americas. Globally, our maternal health programs focus on the best outcomes for mothers and children. Failure to identify risk factors, lack of early screening to detect STDs, inattention to hygiene and health, delayed identification of pregnancy, and a tradition of home births are factors which can endanger a baby’s healthy growth and the health of her mother.

South Sudan has has one of the world’s highest maternal mortality rate; Haiti’s is the highest in the Western Hemisphere.

We make long term commitments to communities globally. We collaborate with local institutions and health personnel to create integrated, consistent responses targeting killers of women of childbearing age, pregnant women, and newborns. We focus on providing antenatal care to prevent and treat complications.

Interventions include:

  • Increasing access to focused antenatal care, facility-based deliveries, and skilled birth attendants.
  • Identification and management of infectious diseases, including HIV, syphilis, and other sexually transmitted infections.
  • Promotion of tetanus toxoid immunization.
  • Intermittent preventive treatment for malaria during pregnancy.
  • Management of obstetric complications such as preeclampsia and hemorrhage.
  • Education to promote the use of skilled facility-based deliveries and healthy behaviors such as breastfeeding, early postnatal care, and planning for optimal pregnancy spacing.

CMMB also addresses cultural, behavioral, socioeconomic, health system, and other challenges, especially those that contribute to the three primary delays that inhibit pregnant women from reaching maternal care:

  • Delay in the decision to seek care.
  • Delay in identifying and reaching a health facility that provides maternal care.
  • Delay in receipt of adequate and appropriate treatment.

Evidence shows that by addressing these delays, we can positively impact a mother’s utilization of critical health services and her maternal health outcomes.

Safe Motherhood in South Sudan

In 2013, CMMB initiated a Safe Motherhood project at the Ezo Primary Health Care Center in Nzara County as part of our CHAMPS (Children & Mothers Partnerships) program. The project directly responds to the “three delays” and leverages CMMB’s volunteer program to expand access to quality care. The project encourages, mentors, and tangibly supports traditional birth attendants (TBAs) to refer pregnant women for facility-based antenatal care and delivery. TBA-related efforts have led to consistent increases in the number of pregnant women referred for antenatal care, prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT), and outpatient services.

Projects

Strengthening Quality Care at St. Theresa Mission Hospital
CMMB helped to build four new critical buildings and improve staff capacity in a hospital in Nzara.
Tackling Newborn Mortality in Peru
CMMB tackled maternal anemia, low birth weight, and other issues driving the unusually high maternal and child mortality in the communities we support.
Eliminating Malaria in Haiti
CMMB Haiti is strengthening community and health facility malaria prevention, diagnostic, and treatment capacity, targeting pregnant women and children under five.
Primary Healthcare for the Poor in South Sudan
CMMB South Sudan was tasked with standardizing, functionalizing, equipping, and staffing health facilities to provide the minimum package of high-quality primary healthcare services.
Reducing HIV Infections in South Sudan
CMMB is implementing ANISA, a five-year, $6.35 million HIV prevention and care project in Yambio to reduce the incidence of new infections and improve care to persons living with HIV.
Helping Orphans and Vulnerable Children
With support from USAID, CMMB Zambia works as a subpartner to Luapula Foundation, a local NGO, to strengthen district and community structures aimed at improving services for orphans and vulnerable children.
Toward a Healthy First 1,000 Days in Peru
This program targeted two especially vulnerable groups in Peru: children during the period between birth and age two, and expectant mothers.
Making Motherhood Safer in South Sudan
This program encourages, mentors, and tangibly supports traditional birth attendants (TBAs) to refer pregnant women for facility-based prenatal care and delivery.
Better Health for New Mothers and Babies in Haiti's Cité Soleil
In one of the largest slums in the Northern Hemisphere, CMMB is working to increase desperately poor families' access to primary healthcare services and to end diarrhea, pneumonia, malaria, and other preventable childhood killers.
Ending Malaria in Zambian Communities
CMMB Zambia worked to protect women and children from malaria, which accounts for half the deaths of Zambians under five and 20 percent of maternal deaths.
Improving the Health of Haiti’s Moms and Children
CMMB Haiti is working to improve the health of mothers and children for better birth outcomes, improved family nutritional status and reduced morbidity from childhood illnesses.
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