Integrated Antenatal Care in Central Mozambique
Along with our Ministry of Health partners in central Mozambique, we help to support an integrated model of antenatal (prenatal) care, or IANC, as part of maternal and child health care in the central Mozambican provinces of Sofala, Manica and Tete.
Grounded in primary health care, IANC seeks to provide women with a comprehensive package of services, through a wide-spread network of PHC facilities that addresses all health ANC needs. For expecting mothers making the often long voyage to a health clinic, integrated antenatal care means they will receive HIV testing, post-test counseling and referral, syphilis screening, anti-tetanus vaccination, malaria treatment and prevention, as well as other interventions that contribute to better maternal and child health.
Specific efforts in central Mozambique have focused on the training of new doctors, nurses and public health specialists capable of delivering antenatal care services, ensuring the availability of essential medical equipment and supplies at Ministry of Health-managed clinics and hospitals, and the implementation of new strategies and tools designed to make the national health system more efficient and responsive to patient needs.
Through such work, remarkable gains are being made in critical areas such as the prevention mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT). In early 2002, we supported the launch of the first PMTCT services in the country in the port city of Beira. Since then, our assistance has resulted in the expansion and integration of PMTCT services into more than 190 new antenatal care facilities in the region, saving the lives of countless children born to HIV-positive mothers. Similar strides have been made to advance the diagnosis and treatment of syphilis (see our case study) and malaria, offer universal access to child vaccinations, and provide insecticide treated mosquito nets to mothers and families.
These activities are currently funded by PEPFAR and UNICEF.