The Lagos State government, in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Health and John Snow Incorporated, JSI, has concluded plans to domesticate the national guidelines on self-care for sexual, reproductive and maternal health.
If executed, Lagos will become the first state in Nigeria to accomplish it.
The main objective of the self-care intervention is to improve the health of Nigerian women and their children through scaling up self-care interventions in the planning of families, thereby reducing preventable deaths of women from pregnancy related causes.
Director and Head of Reproductive Health, Federal Ministry of Health, Dr. Binyerem Ukaire, who spoke at the opening ceremony of a four days’ workshop on the ‘Domestication of the National Guidelines for Self-Care for Sexual Reproductive and Maternal Health in Lagos State,’ said the programme aligns with one of the ministry’s mandates – providing technical support to all the states in the federation to facilitate the domestication and implementation of national policies at state and community levels.
Ukaire said: “In alignment with the World Health Organisation’s recommendations on self-care, the Federal Ministry of Health in collaboration with her partners has provided strategic direction through the National Guidelines for the introduction and scale-up of DMPA SC Self Injection, as a game changer for achieving the sustainable development goal 3.7 on ensuring universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights to all Nigerians.
“Some of these self-care interventions cut across many health-related issues that are common with women. It is notable that the Lagos state Ministry of Health is setting the pace in domesticating the Self-care Intervention in Nigeria particularly because this action will motivate other states to do likewise. Health impact becomes tangible when it happens at state and community levels. DMPA-SC Self Injection is well accepted by women and will increase access especially for women in hard-to-reach areas. It has the potential to reposition the reproductive health status of Nigerians by 2030.”
While commending Lagos state for being the first state in Nigeria to take the initiative, the Director affirmed that the self-care products help the Nigerian woman to satisfy her sexual reproductive human rights as they are easy to use and are helpful in bridging the gaps between the facility and the community as well as the provider and the client as witnessed during the COVID pandemic.
Also speaking, JSI Team Lead for the self-care implementation, Mr Gbenga Ishola, said the whole essence is to empower the citizens to be able to make some specific decisions with the help of the healthcare providers’ counselling and guiding them to do the right thing so that they can achieve quality care.
Ishola also said the guidelines have been disseminated in 24 states but Lagos State is the only state for now that is trying to domesticate the guidelines, adding: “We need to take it beyond what can be given to individual clients at the health facility for people to take their health into their own hands.
JSI and other implementing partners are supporting the federal and state governments to disseminate and domesticate the guideline to achieve the goal of healthcare coverage in Nigeria. However, that is not to say that we are just throwing it to them, the purpose is for the healthcare providers and service delivery people to be able to educate them and make them aware to know how they can do things through counselling, specifically counselling comes first, we just don’t give out a new product to anybody because of abuse but there is a need to actually educate them to know what they can do on their own.”
In addition, the Consultant for the programme in Lagos, Dr Giresse Landry Sagbo, explained that it is important for a central state like Lagos to own the document, review it so that it will suit the Lagos state context.
“What we are doing today is mostly to adapt the guideline and develop the cost implementation plan looking at what we already have in place and what we can put in terms of resources from the health system point.” Landry said.
On foreseeable challenges to the programme’s success, Landry urged all the major stakeholders to see the clients as the most important people in the value chain.
“All the major stakeholders must realise that the clients are the most important people in the value chain, and they must be placed at the centre of the scheme of things. It has to be taken in a bottom top approach and not the other way round.” He added.