HealthKeepers Network

monthly UPDATES:

Activities held in DECEMBER 2017

Picture: A Public Health Nurse in Karaga District Educating Community Members on the use of Cycle Beads (Credit HKN)                                                                                                                                                                                   4^TH JANUARY, 2018

HKN SIGNIFICANT ACCOMPLISHMENTS in December 2017. 

1. TRAINING: Youth in School

In December, HKN in collaboration with the Karaga and Sagnarigu Districts Education Service and Health Directorate organized two trainings on Adolescent and Sexual Reproductive Health for a total of 80 youths-in-school to become Youth Peer-Educators (YPEs) in their schools. The trainings were held in Karaga and Sagnarigu Districts. In Karaga, a total of 40 students (15 males and 25 females) participated in the training. They were drawn from Karaga Girls Model J.H.S; Karaga D/A J.H.S; Karaga R/C J.H.S and; Ishadia E/A J.H.S.

The participating schools in the Sagnarigu District were Choggu Yapalsi J.H.S; Kanvilli R/C J.H.S; Gumani Hassaniya J.H.S; and Bagabaga J.H.S. A total of 40 students made up of 20 males and 20 females benefitted from the training. The two trainings were observed by the Karaga and Sagnarigu Districts Public Health Nurses, District School Health Education Promotion (SHEP) Coordinators and Girls Education Officers.  Also in attendance were eight (8) teachers, one from each school where participants were selected from. The teachers are expected to supervise the activities of the youth peer-educators in their school after their training. Table 1 below provides a summary of the trainings held in December.

Table 1: HKN trainings held in December

2. SUPERVISION

The field supervision team scheduled and visited community-based agents in twelve (13) Districts/Municipalities/Metropolis across four (4) regions in December. In all nine (9) HealthKeeper groups, seven (7) Over-the-Counter Medicine Sellers (OTCMS) groups, three (3) Youth Peers Educators (YPEs) groups formed from 12 schools and one (1) Kayayei group were visited.

During the visits, the community-based agents were given onsite quizzes to test their knowledge and to refresh their memory in some of the essential topics on family planning and HIV prevention. E.g. who can take Secure® pill, what to do if one misses a pill or two, advantages of taking Secure® pills, benefits of family planning, advantages of condom use, how to wear condom among others topics. The rationale is to promote top of mind awareness on some of these topics to enable them to counsel their customers and give proper and correct feedbacks.

Also during the supervisory visits, the baskets and commodities of the CBDs were physically inspected to check for damages, stock-outs, expiry and products storage condition. Some of the HealthKeepers, OTCMS and Kayayei who needed new supplies of products including condoms and Secure® pills were restocked. Table 2 below provides a summary of places and the category of community-based agents visited in December.

Table 2: Supervisory visits undertaken in December.

Outcomes of Supervision

1. HealthKeepers and OTCMS

• It was found out that the HealthKeepers and OTCMS are not only selling products and providing consumer information on these products but are still educating their community members on family planning and HIV prevention.
• One HealthKeeper in the Savelugu-Nanton district, Issah was seen at the Pong Tamale night market educating the youth there on condom use. He mentioned that most of the young people gather at the night marketplace during that time so he takes advantage of it.

Picture 1: HealthKeepers Issah, educating some youth in Pong Tamale during the night market activities.

• The presence of HealthKeepers in some communities in the Northern region is contributing to increase in the uptake of condoms and Secure® pills. For instance in the Mion district communities such as Nasoni, Bioyili, Adam kuraa, Mbatinga, Gnani, Naapachie the patronage of Secure® pills and Condoms by community members is on the rise. Similarly, in the Karaga district, communities like Gunaayili, Napoligu, Monkula, Kuduli, Komoayili, Nyengbalo and Nangungkpang have been patronizing the condoms and Secure® pills from HealthKeepers.

• At Nasia in the West Mamprusi district, six (6) HealthKeepers whose baskets were damaged were replaced. They attributed the damages to the long distances they had to travel to serve customers in hard to reach communities.

1. Youth in School (Link Up)

Nine (9) schools in the Savelugu-Nanton and Mion districts in the Northern region and three (3) schools in the Adaklu district in the Volta region were visited as shown in Table 3 below.

Table 3: Visits undertaken to Youth Peer Educators in-school

The team noted from monitoring forms collected from the Youth Peer Educators that most of them had started interacting with and educating their peers on adolescent health. A case in point is the story of Abdul Karim Abdallah, one of the Youth Peer Educators trained in Savelugu.

Abdul attends Rawdatul Atfal JHS Block B.  During a supervision visit to his school in December 2017, the field team learned from one of the teachers that he educates his peers by gathering them together in a group. He does it regularly so he has become known in the school for adolescent health education.

Picture 2: Abdul Karim Abdallah highlighted seating on the front row

Abdul Karim educates his peers on teenage pregnancy and its effects, STIs, good hygiene and sexual reproductive rights of youths and usually refers questions that are beyond his capacity to his teachers to address. He doesn’t limit himself to only his schoolmates but also friends from other schools and those out of school.

• Kayayei

The field team made their first visit to thirteen (13) Kayayei in Darkuman, Zongo and Old Fadama in December and interacted with them.  They are part of the first batch of Kayayei trained in the Accra Metro to become HealthKeepers. Their activities so far are encouraging and off to a great start.

All the 13 Kayayei reported educating their colleagues on family planning and HIV prevention. However, only two (2) of them submitted their M&E forms. The Kayayei were asked questions to make them recall counseling points on Secure® on Condoms. Most of them were able to answer correctly and demonstrated how they educate their clients. They were taken through the reporting forms and encouraged to record all their interactions.

Pictures 3: Supervision of some Kayayei from Old Fadama at Agbogbloshie

• At the time of visit, 6 Kayayei out of the 13 had sold all their condom and Secure® pills and were re-stocked. Most of them made payments and were resupplied with commodities, however, some of them had barely sold any of their products. They mentioned that they were shy and people were calling them names etc. The leader of the Kayayei Youth association informed them to interact with each other often. He suggested that they could meet weekly and share successes and challenges so that those who are selling their products could assist those who are not able to sell to avoid stock-outs and expiry. They exchanged phone numbers and promised to do that.
• The Kayayei indicated that there is demand for condoms but most of the people they interacted with prefer branded and scented condoms as they believe that those ones are of superior quality to the non-branded ones. That misconception was clarified and they were assured that they will soon be given USAID’s Protector Brand of condoms to distribute to meet those demands.
• The involvement of Kayayei community leaders and leaders of their association in the supervision ensured that most of Kayayei were present during the visit and they came with their baskets neatly kept.
• A visit has been scheduled in January for the Kayayei in Madina and Mallam Atta. In the meantime, phone calls were made to them to follow up and resolve any challenges that may have. None of them had recorded stock out.

3. COMMUNITY OUTREACH

Only one community outreach was organized in December. It was held in the Karaga district in front of the Karaga Naa’s palace. HKN organized the outreach in collaboration with the Karaga district health directorate, chief, elders, and assemblyman. Prior to holding the outreach, there were several discussions between the various stakeholders to make sure the planning and implementation of the community outreach were successful.

The services offered at the outreach included but not limited to family planning education and counseling, HIV testing and counseling, Blood pressure monitoring and Weight/Height measurement to check Body Mass Index. Seventeen (17) out of twenty-four (24) HealthKeepers trained in the District participated in the outreach and were presented with their certificates during the outreach. One hundred and fifty-nine (109 females and 50 males) community members attended the outreach.

Table 4: Details of Community Outreach

Picture 4: A community outreach organized by HKN in front of the Karaga Naa’s palace at Karaga, Northern Region.

Outcome from Karaga Outreach

• All the 159 people who attended were counseled and provided with family planning and HIV prevention messages. The District Public Health Nurse Mr. Iddrisu Alhassan and his team demonstrated to them how to wear a condom, how to use cycle beads and oral contraceptives pills. The District health team also used the outreach as an opportunity to educate some students of Karaga Senior High School on Adolescent Health, good hygiene, and family planning.

• One hundred and forty-four (144) persons tested for their HIV status, however, there was no positive cases.
• Three (3) pregnant women and nine (9) women with babies under 2 years were registered during the outreach.

4. RESUPPLIES AND SUPPORT VISITS

The supply team in December, visited all the categories of CBDs in 15 Districts/Municipalities as shown in detail in Table 5 below.

Table 5: Details of resupply visits in December 2017

CYP CONTRIBUTION

HKN’s total CYP contribution made from the condom and oral contraceptive pills distribution in December was 3,787.77. The breakdown is shown in Table 6 below.

Table 6:  HKN CYP Contributions

5. OTHER ACTIVITIES HELD IN DECEMBER 2017.

12th December 2017: HKN participated in the Ghana Health Services led ICC/CS meeting.

6. CONCLUSION

HealthKeepers Network community-based family planning and HIV prevention project is going according to work plan and on track to achieving its overall goal. HKN greatly value the management and technical assistance it is obtaining from JSI-RTI and USAID-Ghana as well as the funding support of USAID, its partnerships with the various MMDAs, MoH/GHS, GES, GAC and others which has made such progress possible.

Thank you.