Making Births Safe: Haiti

The Haiti: Make Births Safe campaign has advanced a number of improvements in maternal and child health care in northern Haiti.  These highlights include:

• Decreasing newborn mortality: Supported aquality improvement initiative with colleagues inthe Pediatric Department of Justinian UniversityHospital that led to a 67% decrease in thechance of a newborn dying  in the pediatric unitin 2014 compared to 2013.

• Family planning: In collaboration with a research teamfrom Emory University School of Medicine, completeda study of abortion practices in Cap-Haitien. Whileabortion is illegal in Haiti, the study found that womenare knowledgeable about methods to induce abortion,but often delay seeking post-abortion care due toperceived stigma from health care providers. The studyalso highlighted high levels of unmet need for familyplanning in Cap-Haitien. The ndings of the studywere presented to partners throughout the Ministry ofHealth and potential strategies to address these issuesare being discussed with partners.
• Safer births: Advanced our collaborative ‘Haiti: MakeBirths Safe’ initiative with Haiti Hospital Appeal by jointly initiating a 3-year project that will expandcommunity- based maternal and child health servicesto previously underserved areas in Quartier Morin andthe Cap-Haitien section of Bande du Nord.
• Nutrition Research: Collaborated with WashingtonUniversity to conduct a study that was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (January 2014). Itshowed that supplementation can have a positive effect onstunting, but the effects are limited in context of ongoingdiarrheal illness. Konbit Sante staff joined other partnerorganizations to share the results in Port- au-Prince tothe Haitian Ministry of Health and others; a presentationthat was lmed for both national television and radio

These achevements were possible because of your support.  You can contact us directly at anytime at info@healthybirthing.org, or through the implementing partners of this campaign:

Konbit Sante- www.healthyhaiti.org

Haiti Hospital Appeal: www.haitihospitalappeal.org