Save Mothers and Babies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Dear Friends,

Thank you to all who donated to our GlobalGiving Microproject: Save Mothers and Babies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Thanks to your generosity, we were able to equip 5 frontline maternal healthcare workers with the training they need to provide high quality maternal healthcare in Tanzania. With the skills and confidence to address emergencies, these healthcare professionals will now be able to save more lives during delivery.

We wanted to share a real example of what this looks like in the facilities where the CCBRT Maternal Health Capacity Building (MHCB) team is training and mentoring medical professionals. Below is an excerpt from a report we received from the MHCB team’s project manager, Dr. Brenda D’mello.

“Recently, we conducted a refresher on-the-job training for healthcare workers that focused on postpartum hemorrhage (PPH). PPH is the leading cause of maternal mortality in Tanzania, accounting for more than 30% of all maternal deaths. The tragedy is that death due to PPH is preventable. The challenge is it requires an entire team to respond. Unfortunately, a full team of medical professionals is not always available. Staff shortages, gaps in training, and overwhelmed, overcrowded delivery wards in Tanzania are all factors that can contribute to a mother’s life being lost in just minutes.

At one of the facilities where my team trains and mentors healthcare workers, the supervising medical officer identified that staffing was an issue and that sometimes emergency cases did not have the support they needed. She wisely requested that we train non-maternal healthcare staff in PPH management. So, we conducted the training, even training outpatient nurses and staff from wards serving men only.

One week after the training, this medical officer called me with so much excitement. The night before, a patient had delivered her baby, and began to hemorrhage after delivery. The attending nurse shouted for help, but the doctor and only other nurse on duty in the ward were handling an emergency caesarean section in the operating theater. The nurse’s cries reached the neighboring wards, and ‘help’ came running from the outpatient and men’s wards. Thanks to the training they had received the week before, everyone knew exactly what to do. The team saved the mother’s life.

The medical officer told me that before her staff received the PPH training, they would have been afraid to respond to an emergency like this, but not anymore. Her staff were excited and motivated. She said, ‘For them, it truly was a sweet victory.’

My team and I are always grateful for these moments. Equipment and innovation in low-resource settings are critical for progress, but at the heart of our success lies one indispensable resource: people. It is the people we train, their collaboration, their courage in the face of emergencies, and their dedication to their patients that will change the face of maternal healthcare in Tanzania. And it is your support that empowers us to keep going.”

We are so grateful for your support.

Thanks to your generosity, more healthcare teams will be equipped to save lives at birth, to prevent birth injuries like obstetric fistula, and to identify congenital disabilities like clubfoot for immediate referral and treatment. Just as one nurse cannot do the work of a full team, our success requires us all to work together for the mothers we are serving. Thank you for supporting this life saving work, and for helping us steward well the lives of women and newborns in our care.

Be well,

Abbey Kocan
Executive Director, Kupona Foundation