Title : Advancing women’s health with adaptive management: A paradigm of holistic & quality healthcare approach
Abstract:
Adaptive learning is an advanced quality improvement process, which entails a multi-level coordinated action. It provides an insight to project implementation activities that guides project actions and also sencourage useful programmatic changes. The process not only involves continuous learning, but also the encourages project adaptation.
When this integration of adaptive learning is overlooked in any project cycle; the opportunities to improve project design are lost and outcomes suffers. This is evident through the BetterBirth Trial, which was the randomized study of the implementation of the World Health Organization (WHO) Safe Childbirth Checklist in India. Here, the coaching of birth attendants and managers produced greater adherence to essential birth practices, representing significant improvements in care for women and newborns. However, the program failed to reduce neonatal and maternal morbidity and mortality. Only after the study period was recorded the lack of impact on death rates attributed to persistent gaps in skills, supplies, or systems for care of complications.
Thus, adaptive learning supports the operationalization of complexity-aware monitoring and adaptive management by creating the culture, institutional support, and practices needed for project staff to be ready to use new information and effectively adapt projects to changes. This facilitates an enhanced presence and demand for quality and equitable services. It strengthened local capacity, and strengthened multisectoral partnerships, leading to improvements in maternal, neonatal, and child health. Nonetheless, defining applicable procedures, approaches and policies are vital, the available literature advocates that for proactive health priorities, adaptive learning is a progressive approach to adapt to ever changing health circumstances. And this specially holds importance in today’s modern world of unpredictable health menaces.
Audience Take Away:
- The proposed adaptive strategies shall improve the program design accuracy and support in documenting programming assumptions
- To provide insight on how to inform decisions that optimize health program implementation and hence output.
- Using the After Action Reviews to expand research or teaching effort
- The model discussed shall provide a practical solution to loop-in problems that occur continuously in health programs.
- Collecting a variety of quantitative and qualitative monitoring information during health program implementation
