Improving transport and communication between facilities
The timely transfer of women between health facilities is essential for ensuring access to timely obstetric care if local health centres do not have appropriate facilities. An effective referral system requires good communication systems between the different levels of facilities and readily available transport services.
In Mali, the government developed a programme to strengthen its referral system. It invested in radio communication among referral centres and procured vehicles for patient transport. Under this system, the time required to transmit an urgent message and transport a patient is reduced from up to a day to just a few hours (Grieco and Turner 2005). In Sierra Leone, investment in vehicles and improved communication systems lead to a doubling of utilisation of EmOC and a fifty per cent reduction in case fatalities (Razzak and Kellerman, 2002).
In Suba district - Nyanza province, Kenya, the DFID funded Essential Health Services programme has provided cell phones and solar powered battery chargers to all the health facilities. This has made communication between the health centres and the district hospital during an obstetric or neonatal emergency possible. The approach is being monitored under the programmes operational research component (Dr R Pendame personal communication 2007).
In Mali, the government developed a programme to strengthen its referral system. It invested in radio communication among referral centres and procured vehicles for patient transport. Under this system, the time required to transmit an urgent message and transport a patient is reduced from up to a day to just a few hours (Grieco and Turner 2005). In Sierra Leone, investment in vehicles and improved communication systems lead to a doubling of utilisation of EmOC and a fifty per cent reduction in case fatalities (Razzak and Kellerman, 2002).
In Suba district - Nyanza province, Kenya, the DFID funded Essential Health Services programme has provided cell phones and solar powered battery chargers to all the health facilities. This has made communication between the health centres and the district hospital during an obstetric or neonatal emergency possible. The approach is being monitored under the programmes operational research component (Dr R Pendame personal communication 2007).
- Emergency medical care in developing countries: is it worthwhile?
- ( J. A. Razzak;A. L. Kellermann / Bulletin of the World Health Organization : the International Journal of Public Health , 2002)
- This paper from the World Health Organization (WHO) reviews evidence indicating the need to develop and/or strengthen emergency medical care systems in developing countries. It looks at emergency medi...
