AIDSFree Mother-Baby Pair Retention in Care Through Community Focal Mothers
Overview
In collaboration with the Ministry of Health, USAID, and other key stakeholders, AIDSFree developed a community focal mother (CFM) model to improve retention in care through determination of final PMTCT outcome at 18–24 months. This model uses CFMs to provide community- and household-based follow-up of mother-baby pairs. CFMs are trained and visit mother-baby pairs in their home before they miss a visit to ensure that they continue visiting the health facility for care. CFMs are able to provide referrals to link children and mothers back to care. When a mother-baby pair has missed a child welfare visit, CFMs issue Ministry of Health referral forms to refer them back to care at the health facility.
Since June 2017, AIDSFree has seen success with this program—in Eswatini, more than 350 mother-baby pairs are retained in care, where they have completed their clinic visits and received all services per the Ministry of Health schedule. There have been many successful transfers-out and linkages back to care from missed visits using the referral forms. None of the mother-baby pairs have been lost to follow-up; 100 percent are currently retained in care. AIDSFree is working with the Eswatini Ministry of Health and other partners to plan for national scale-up of the CFM model. Read more about our success in Eswatini in this report.
Maternal & Child Health; Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission