**Plead with Governor Nasir El-Rufai to expand FP unit…..
By Lola Seriki-Idahosa, Kaduna, North-West,Nigeria
Outreach program address inequities in access to family planning services and commodities in order to help women and men meet their reproductive health needs. Outreach has also allow for flexible and strategic deployment of resources, including health care providers, family planning commodities, supplies, equipment, vehicles, and infrastructure, to areas in greatest need at intervals that most effectively meet demand.
Evidence demonstrated of recent in Zaria City shows that outreach programme can successfully increase contraceptive use, particularly in areas of low contraceptive prevalence, high unmet need for family planning, and limited access to contraceptives, and where geographic, economic, or social barriers limit service uptake.
When outreach programmes are well-designed, they help programs broaden the contraceptive method mix available to clients.
Outreach Programs has help to educate, addresses these access barriers by bringing information, contraceptives, and supplies to where women and men live, outreach programs can also leave a lasting legacy that strengthens existing health systems when the model includes developing and supporting local health workers’ knowledge and skills to provide a wider range of method.
Outreach Programs has expand method of choice for women, it has also supported capacity building of providers to deliver and increase contraceptive use.
In a recent tour by some health reporters to Zaria, for assessment of Family Planning provided by Nigerian Urban Reproductive Health Initiative (NURHI) support facilities, clearly shows how outreach programmes has helped both men and women in accepting Family Planning.
Facilities visited includes: Hajiya Gambo Sawaba General Hospital, Kofar Gayan, Primary Health Centre Babban and Primary Health Care Centre Tudun Wada, all located at Zaria City.
In a separate interview with health reporters, the Family Planning Provider at the Tudun Wada PHC, Aisha Muhammed, said that there have been flocks of clients ever since NURHI, intervene at the centre since 2013.
She noted that, with the outreach programs they embark upon in the area, on a weekly basis, over 100 clients do visit the PHC for various FP services and that because of high demands, they usually have shortage of implanor, used for implant in child spacing.
At the Gambo Sawaba General Hospital, Kufan Gaya in Zaria Local Government Area, Head of Nursing Department, Sefiya Magaji, told the team that, NURHI’s intervention has transformed the unit, which is now known by most women as “NURHI” unit.
According to her, “NURHI has been with us for a long time, they have trained so many of our staff, renovated the FP unit, and today we don’t need to beg women to come for FP services. Even some women come here with their husbands and the challenges here are minimal”. Added.
On her part, FP Provider at PHC, Babban Dodo, Halima NATO, explained that most of the drugs at unit are free from NURHI, and that has greatly increased the number of clients visiting the centre to over 75 weekly.
She however, appealed to the state government and NURHI, for expansion of the unit, because it has become too small for the number of clients coming in on a regular basis.
No doubt that the demand for family planning has increased because of awareness, The percentage of women who want to space or limit their births but are not using a method of contraception (i.e., unmet need) has decreased in Kaduna state by 4 percent points, While family planning appears to be reaching more women overall, wealth disparities in use and unmet need persist in kaduna states, suggesting a need for continued efforts to expand access to modern contraception to the underserved poor.
