Sure Start

Sure Start communication efforts are centred around 5 key messages: cord care, thermal care of the newborn, immediate and exclusive breastfeeding, birth preparedness, and danger sign recognition. Working with approximately 20 consortia of NGOs and other institutions, PATH and its partners implemented district-wide community support programmes designed to reduce newborn and maternal disease and death. PATH facilitated and documented learning between districts and states, as well as with national policymakers. Specific activities included:

• Increasing access to and coverage of skilled attendance at birth.
• Building networks of community health workers to assist birth attendants and visit mothers in the first few days after birth.
• Developing community savings programmes to help cover the cost of newborn and maternal complications and referrals.
• Forging links among communities so they can share lessons learned and advocate for greater attention to newborn health. Specific examples include:
  • Pehla Ek Ghanta (The First One Hour - referring to the critical one hour after birth when a mother and family can change the destiny of a child by ensuring practices critical to infant survival). This carnival-like campaign was designed to promote maternal and neonatal health (MNH). The effort includes setting up hoardings (billboards) and outfitting rickshaws with awareness-building messages, as well as organising quizzes and screening films embedded with maternal and newborn health information. Round 2 of the campaign, which was completed in April 2010, reached nearly 5,500 villages, with a focus on holding women's and men's group community meetings for each village. Communication tools, such as a dart game and "wheel of fortune", were used during the morning mothers' group meetings to highlight key messages. For the "evening shows", videos were played on a projector for the entire village, with question and answer games interspersed through the session.
  • In Maharashtra's towns and cities, Sure Start has developed information, education, and communication (IEC) materials to facilitate home visits and spark behaviour change. These materials are prominently displayed in all the health posts and centres of the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation.
  • Letters to fathers-to-be from the unborn child. The unborn child's voice addresses the father-to-be, emphasising the importance of: "my mother receiving tetanus toxoid immunization; my mother receiving iron and folic acid tablets; you, my father, ensuring my mother gets adequate rest and nutrition; ensuring money and transport is prepared for a safe delivery in the hospital; and ensuring my mother attends "mothers' group" meetings in order to learn more about recognizing the warning signs, and being prepared for my birth".
  • Accredited Social Health Activists who make home visits to pregnant women. One such activist explains: "Sure Start has given me good communication material and skills to go into people's houses and explain safe birth practices..."

Women, Children, Health.