Integrating Nutrition into Child Health
MCSP worked to integrate preventative and curative aspects of nutrition programming with integrated community case management (iCCM) – which focuses on managing diarrhea, pneumonia, and malaria by community health workers. The Program also worked on addressing feeding of small and sick newborns within the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative (BFHI) platform.
In DR Congo, in partnership with the Ministry of Health and Programme Nationale de Nutrition (PRONANUT), MCSP conducted formative research entitled “Integration of preventive and curative aspects of nutrition into integrated community case management in the Democratic Republic of Congo.” The purpose of this research was to inform integration of preventative and curative aspects of nutrition into the iCCM program in Tshopo District, DRC. The in-depth interviews and focus group discussions carried out with mothers, families and health providers provided insight into:
- Beliefs and perceptions regarding infant and young child feeding (IYCF)
- Level of knowledge and advice given to mothers and families on IYCF and child illness
- Quality of counseling, treatment(s) administered for child illness
- Child illness, and care seeking behaviors by mothers and families
Results of the study highlighted gaps, weaknesses and opportunities for improving IYCF practices, nutrition services, and integration of nutrition into iCCM programming.
In Malawi and Zambia, MCSP supported operationalization of the Essential Care for Small Babies into the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative (BFHI) platform, which included training of health providers on feeding of small and sick newborns. MCSP also conducted a bottleneck analysis of this activity, following roll out.
