Pregnant women graduate from antenatal school
The La-Nkwantanang Municipal Health Directorate has organised its maiden graduation for pregnant women who participated in an antenatal school with the aim of reducing maternal and child mortality within the municipality.
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The school featured five health centres, including the Pentecost Hospital, Danfa Health Centre, Madina Polyclinic at Rawlings Circle and the Pantang Hospital.
The pregnancy school is an intervention programme to improve skilled care during and after childbirth to save both mothers and their babies.
The weekend programme was operated in two levels, comprising level 100 which constituted women from one to 28 weeks of pregnancy and level 200 which consisted of women from 29 weeks to delivery.
Dubbed, “Reducing infant and maternal morbidity and mortality”, the pregnant women were taken through topics such as nutrition, sexual relation in pregnancy, family planning, males involvement, danger signs, changes in the body and medication.
WHO facts
According to the 2016 World Health Organisation (WHO) report, 830 women globally die from preventable causes of pregnancy and childbirth daily, implying that about 303,000 women die due to pregnancy-related diseases every year.
Ninety-nine per cent of maternal deaths occur among women living in rural areas while poor communities with young adolescents also face a higher risk of complications and deaths in pregnancy.
Significance
At a ceremony in Accra, the Municipal Health Director, Ms Priscilla Siaw, said most social and structural determinants that affected the health and well-being of women in pregnancy were avoidable.
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She said although maternal mortality had dropped to 44 per cent in the country, there was still more to be done to ensure that the Goal 3 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) was achieved.
The Goal 3 works to “ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages”.
Ms Siaw indicated that efforts such as the pregnancy school had been made by the municipality to ensure that the health targets were achievable.
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Record
Ms Siaw said as of June 2017, the municipality had recorded two maternal deaths, adding that the health providers, together with the pregnant mothers, would do their best to ensure that the rest of the year recorded zero maternal mortality.
“The adoption of the pregnancy school as an intervention programme is carved out of the Promote Maternal and Infant Survival Excellence (PROMISE) drivers initiated by the Greater Accra Regional Health Directorate as a step to reduce maternal mortality,” she said.
Ms Siaw urged other delivery facilities in the municipality to adopt the initiative to educate pregnant women.
She also charged the participants to be ambassadors in their various communities.
MCE
The Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) of the La-Nkwantanang Municipal Assembly, Madam Jennifer Dede Afegbedzi, encouraged husbands to be responsible and support their partners, particularly during and after pregnancy, in order to avoid preventable dangers of the mothers and their babies.
She also instituted an award in the subsequent school to honour the most responsible husband who would join the school with his partner.
The Chief of the Danfa Community, Nii Afutu Brempong III, called on pregnant women and potential mothers to be part of the school to gain preconception and pregnancy healthcare knowledge.