January 21, 2025
We have partnered with Dandelion Africa to support the County governments in Baringo, Kajiado, Nakuru, and Narok counties in Kenya to help prevent maternal and neonatal deaths.
This innovative community health solution will help improve maternal, neonatal, and perinatal mortality outcomes by equipping Health Centres, Sub-Hospitals and Community Health Promoters with the Clinitouch smart platform to provide essential Antenatal and Postnatal Care in mothers’ homes, complementing the existing government digital systems.
The Community Health Promoters will use the offline Clinitouch app for monitoring across the mothers’ pregnancies and post birth in the critical 42 day post-partum period. The smart Clinitouch system generates a risk score for mothers and newborns from every monitoring session, which facility staff remotely review on the Clinitouch clinician portal and take immediate action to provide the care needed based on risks or potential complications.
Challenges in accessing antenatal and postnatal care
Kenya has one of the highest Maternal Mortality Rates in the world at 594 deaths per 100,000 live births. The Neonatal Mortality Rate is also estimated to be 20.4 deaths per 1,000 live births as of 2022, compared with the UN Sustainable Development Goal of 12 per 1,000 live births. It goes without saying that any death of a mother or newborn is one too many – particularly when the solutions exist and the deaths are often preventable.
A major underlying problem is too many mothers and their newborns aren’t getting the eight Antenatal Care (ANC) and four Postnatal Care (PNC) contacts recommended by the World Health Organisation to reduce the risk of stillbirths and pregnancy complications and give women a positive pregnancy experience.
In Kenya overall, only approximately 59% of pregnant women even attend at least four antenatal care visits, with a very small percentage getting the eight recommended. Only around 20% of women attend their first antenatal care visit during the first trimester of pregnancy. After birth, over half of women (approximately 53%) do not receive any form of postnatal care at all, and fewer than one in five women receive postnatal care within 41 days after delivery.
Together we will change this
Spirit Health Foundation is an independent non-profit foundation that provides the market-leading Clinitouch platform and services of Spirit Health Group as millions of pounds of in-kind funding to country partners and works with them to build smarter health systems to improve and save lives in underserved communities.
The Foundation will enable this new community heath solution in Kenya through providing unlimited Clinitouch licenses and a range of system design, clinical, technical, and capacity building services to establish, sustain and scale the solution in the county health systems.
Dandelion Africa is a grassroots innovator, dedicated to enhancing the health and economic conditions of youth and women in Kenya’s arid and marginalized rural areas for more than a decade. Founded on the principle of community ownership, the organization employs a community-driven strategy that has significantly improved women’s access to dignified health services. Their efforts have resulted in transformative and systemic changes within rural communities, including a decrease in maternal mortality rates, improved economic outcomes, and the establishment of support systems for survivors of gender-based violence.
Our CEO, Rich Bryson, comments:
“It’s essential that every mother can get the right antenatal and postnatal care. Unfortunately this still isn’t possible for many resulting in far too many lost lives that could be saved.
By equipping health facilities and Community Health Promoters with Clinitouch, we can support Dandelion Africa and County governments in bringing the right antenatal and postnatal care to mothers’ homes, identifying risks or possible complications early to protect mothers and their babies”.
Wendo Sahar, Executive Director, Dandelion Africa, adds
“Connecting Community Health Promoters directly to health facilities through digital means can lead to a 70% reduction in maternal and infant mortality rates. The loss of even one woman during childbirth is unacceptable; this platform aims to fill a significant gap and improves dignified care for everyone”.
The new community health solution will be initially rolled out in Marigat, Mogotio and Kajiado South in the first half 2025, before expansion into more sub-counties later in the year and during 2026.
Want to find out more?
For further information on Spirit Health Foundation, please contact hello@spirithealthfoundation.org.
