Working with Communities for Better Health
Community health is essential for countries to reach every woman and child with health services and to achieve their national health goals. Community interventions and approaches, including engagement of civil society and communities themselves, are needed to advance equity and achieve primary health care for all.
MCSP supports countries to strengthen, scale and institutionalize community approaches and interventions that prevent child and maternal deaths by:
- Stimulating global dialogue on the critical importance of community health and share evidence of what works;
- Supporting national partners to increase coverage of proven interventions for reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health at the household and community level;
- Building the capacity of community health workers, with a focus on technical as well as communication, organization, management and accountability skills;
- Incorporating community health data and its use within national health management information systems; and
- Engaging communities and civil society organizations as essential partners in promoting health-seeking and advocating for improved service quality.
MCSP helps countries #careforcommunities.
In low-income settings, women’s groups practicing participatory learning and action can improve maternal & newborn survival.
Community health worker programs yield high economic return on investment – up to 10:1.
Our Featured Resources
- Six Country Experiences: Community Monitoring of Individual Children’s Vaccinations
- Report: Community-based Care in Ethiopia
- Journal Article: Baby-Friendly Community Initiative From Guidelines to Implementation
- Program Brief: Mozambique Community Health
- 10 Critical Principles: Institutionalizing Community Health
- Report: Evidence map of social, behavioural and community engagement interventions for RMNCH
- Journal Article: Expanding evidence approaches for improving and sustaining community health programmes
- Report: Round Table on Social Accountability
- Journal Article: Examining India’s national community health worker programme
- Report: Learning from Polio Communication and Community Engagement Initiatives
- Tools and Resources: Social Accountability
- Report: Two Promising Social Accountability Approaches to Improve Health in Malawi
- Brief: Costs and Cost-Effectiveness of Community Health Investments in RMNCH
- Journal Article: Gender Inequalities Facing India’s Accredited Social Health Activists
- Landscape Analysis: National Community Health Worker Programs
- Journal article: Integrating Community Roles into Health Systems Frameworks to Achieve Health for All
Community health is supremely important for improving maternal and child health. More lives could be saved through the scale-up and strengthening of interventions at the community level than at hospitals and health centers combined.
— Melanie Morrow, MCSP Community Health & Civils Society Engagement Team Lead
