Activities in Madhya Pradesh

ACTIVITIES TO COMBAT COVID THROUGH THE HEALTH SYSTEM STRENGTHENING PROGRAMME IN MADHYA PRADESH

Jan Swasthya Sahyog (JSS) is implementing three projects, namely IGUNATMAC (Quality Improvement of Maternal and New born Healthcare in Public Health facilities), Pushparajgarh Health and Nutrition Initiative (PHNI) and Sickle Cell Anaemia Control Mission at Anuppur and Dindori districts, Madhya Pradesh as part of health system strengthening. These projects have dedicated field teams consisting of District Coordinators, Lab Assistants, Auxiliary Nurse Midwives (ANMs), Nurse Mentors, and Resource Persons. ANM mentors are posted at 12 sub health centres in the area. With the surge in the instances of Covid patients and influenza like illness in the field areas, all the field teams are now involved in combating Covid. JSS has started the following activities:

Community Awareness:

 After their initial training on COVID, Village level teams, volunteers, Phulwari workers will be creating awareness about new/ changing symptoms of the disease and prevention through techniques of physical distancing, face mask, hand hygiene etc. A training of master trainers for training ASHA workers on Covid19 symptoms and precautions, vaccination and home management of mild Covid patients is also underway. Training of Phulwari Workers, Sehat Sakhi, volunteers, Rojgar Sahayyak, Anganwadi workers on above-mentioned topics will be done in Karpa and Titahi- Jaithari sector villages. Four teams have been formed that will work as awareness teams as well as influenza like illness (ILI) treatment teams. These teams are being equipped with all necessary protective gear like masks, had gloves, face shields and awareness material such as pamphlets, posters, audio awareness devices and medicines.

Detection and treatment of mild and moderate Covid cases:

PHNI has a component of ANM mentoring under which ANM mentors are appointed at sub health centres. The ANM mentors along with government ANMs are treating patients with symptoms of Covid and supporting their families for home management of the patients. They are also engaged in doing pulse-oximetry of home isolated patients. For this, we are in the process of procuring pulse-oximeters, thermal scanners. As there is a huge surge in the influenza like illnesses, the common medicines are running out of stock at fast pace and refilling them takes a significant time through government processes. Thus, JSS is providing medicines to these sub health centres as needed for supplementation. Along with this, fever cum awareness surveys will be conducted for early detection of patients with Covid symptoms. Testing facilities are currently not available in rural areas even at the block level. We are advocating for initiating these at the block level and even sector level and at sub-health centres so that confirmation of Covid patients will be done quickly and it will also help to unravel actual burden of disease in rural areas.

Arranging referral for severe Covid cases:

Getting an ambulance or any other transport in case of medical emergency is not an easy task in these remote and poorly connected areas. Considering the restrictions imposed amid rising Covid cases, getting a transport has become even more difficult. Community needs support to take patient to the referral centre in case home isolated patient deteriorates. There is a possibility that the need of referrals may increase significantly and there will be a need of dedicated vehicle(s) for transport of patients/suspects.

Ensuring quality of life of Covid survivors:

To support the Covid survivors, support groups of Covid patients will be formed and counselling will be provided to the individual patients and their families. It has been observed that many of the survivors need post-covid help in terms of mental health support and physiotherapy. We plan to fulfil these needs of survivors from rural areas through support groups and counselling.

Providing support to government machinery for testing and vaccination and training of different cadres:

Lab assistants from our field screening teams of Sickle cell project are trained for covid testing and they are now providing support for covid testing at Anuppur district hospital and community health centres. ANM mentors and field awareness teams are providing support for Covid vaccination drives in terms of awareness and assistance at vaccination centres. Training of different cadres of health care staff from ANM-Trainers to CHO, AYUSH practitioners, Medical Officers is on the cards to help community outreach for COVID suspects and their monitoring, timely referral and management.