By Our Reporter
More than 53,000 mothers have delivered safely in small, private sector facilities over the last four years since the launch of the MSD for Ugandan Mothers (MUM) project. Through the MUM project, providers work to ensure that pregnant women, particularly those in remote and low-income communities, have access to affordable, quality maternal health products and services through the ProFam network of privately owned franchise clinics.
This comprehensive project also works beyond the clinic setting by helping women overcome common barriers to care such as cost, transportation and limited supplies. The MUM project includes 142 health facilities in 42 districts in Uganda. This covers more than one third of the country impacting and estimated 130,000 women.
Recognizing the opportunity to improve maternal health in Uganda, the MUM project worked with small midwife owned facilities that are often closest and therefore, the first facilities that mothers reach when in labor. The Program for Accessible health, Communication and Education (PACE), the lead implementing partner of the MUM project, has worked with many of these facilities since 2008 through its social franchise network, ProFam. The ProFam franchise is a network of private sector healthcare providers that provide high quality health services at affordable prices under a common brand.
In a press release seen by this magazine, Dr. Frank Kaharuza, the Executive Director, Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of Uganda (AOGU) said, “Private sector providers if trained and supported will offer high quality maternity healthcare services to the mothers before, during and after delivery. This increases the chances of survival for the mother and the baby.
Allan Chekwech Steps into Daniel Kalinaki's Big Shoes at NMG UgandaAOGU facilitated the training and mentorship of health providers as part of the MUM project.
Fourteen PACE trained facilities in South Western Uganda are now part of the Ministry of Health’s Uganda Reproductive Health Voucher program (URHVP), enabling them to offer maternal health services at a subsidized cost to the mother.
William Nyombi, the program manager for URHVP noted that in general, social franchised facilities like ProFam were the first choice for private sector facilities offering voucher services due to the high quality clinical standards and competency of clinical workers and service providers to deliver quality reproductive health services.
“The investment in facility and provider quality that these facilities have been supported to do makes them ideal voucher service delivery partners,
