1. Training and collaboration

Volunteers are recruited from their local communities. They are trained in first aid and mother and child health. Because they are community-based, local people learn skills to help themselves and their neighbours.

2. Household visits

Volunteers make door-to door visits to help families develop a birth plan, teach them about danger signs and provide advice on what to do in an emergency. Pregnant women and new mothers learn to adopt healthy behaviours, make healthier choices around safe motherhood and infancy by taking charge of their own health.

Volunteers encourage women to use antenatal and postnatal services early and regularly, and make health referrals for individuals. Their partners learn to support their spouses and children, e.g. jointly planning a safe birth and saving enough money for transportation to the clinic.

3. Community health education

St John volunteers reach large numbers of community members with health education sessions to promote wider support for pregnant women and new mothers.

4. Support for local clinics

St John supplies a basic package of support based on local needs, such as scales to weigh pregnant women and newborns or blood pressure monitors.

5. Mobile outreach clinics

St John supports outreach clinics that travel to remote villages where  services are not available. These makeshift clinics provide HIV testing, family planning, and checks for pregnant women, new mothers and babies.

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I am very grateful to St John for the support rendered to me during the last trimester of the previous pregnancy. I delivered well in Jinja Hospital having planned well for the pregnancy and birth of our baby.

Nabagala Fatumah, Uganda

Learn more about our Mother and Baby Programme