The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) has launched the Optimised Client Centred Services (OptiCCs) project to tackle maternal health challenges in Nigeria. The country’s maternal mortality rate remains a public health concern, with 512 women dying per 100,000 live births, accounting for 20 per cent of global maternal deaths.
The OptiCCs project aims to optimise antenatal care uptake, ensuring that pregnant women in the country’s primary health care facilities receive quality integrated services and care.
The project seeks to build on three major intervention areas and has four objectives: to increase the number of antenatal care (ANC) visits, improve the integration of ANC with other primary health care services, enhance the provision and experience of quality antenatal care, and build the capacity of healthcare workers on the provision of quality ANC and integrated primary health care services.
The OptiCCs intervention will have a pilot phase in the states of Anambra, Kebbi and Jigawa. The project is financed by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), co-financed by UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office through GIZ Nigeria.
In her remarks, the German Development Cooperation/GIZ, back-up health and country team lead, Ms. Fatima Zanna, said that OptiCCs aimed to generate evidence showing improvement in service delivery, service uptake, and service quality using a digital application that would guide healthcare workers in promoting the integration of ANC and other primary health care services.
“It serves as a continuum for skilled attendance at birth and healthy behaviours such as breastfeeding and early postnatal care, including immunisation and family planning.
“Unfortunately, in Nigeria, low ANC attendance and high dropout rates have continued to impact negatively on maternal and child health outcomes,” she explained.
ANC is an important platform to provide HIV, tuberculosis and malaria services during pregnancy. It serves as a continuum for skilled attendance at birth and healthy behaviours such as breastfeeding, early postnatal care, immunisation and family planning.
The country representative of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Nigeria, Dr. Walter Molumbo expressed hope that the project would lead to a decrease in ANC dropout rates and an increase in PHC deliveries, as well as improved integration, quality provision of services and quality data to inform policymakers’ decisions on ANC optimisation and service integration.
The Emir of Jiwa, Alhaji Idris Musa, highlighted that maternal mortality remains a major global health indicator, and poor access to water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) is a significant contributing factor to high levels of diarrhoea-related deaths.
He expressed hope in the OptiCCs project and stated that maternity care that focuses on women’s needs and treats women respectfully could lead to greater satisfaction and better and more equitable health outcomes in the country.
