Facility Staff Perspectives on the Implementation of Maternal and Perinatal Death Surveillance and Response in Six Health Facilities in Kigoma, Tanzania

Sarah Huber-Krum, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Florina Serbanescu, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
Sarah Hartley, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Patricia Spencer, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Lauren Galioto, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Abdulaziz Msuya, CDC Foundation, Field

Implementing and sustaining Maternal and Perinatal Death Surveillance and Response (MPDSR) is an important strategy for identifying medical and non-medical factors that contributed to maternal deaths and formulating recommendations and action plans to prevent future deaths. We used qualitative in-depth interviews (IDIs) with 22 health facility staff in 6 hospitals located in Kigoma Region, Tanzania to identify factors that influenced MPDSR implementation outcomes. Guided by two implementation science frameworks, we identified several factors that facilitated MPDSR sustainability and barriers for adoption and implementation of MPDSR. Prominent facilitators included positive perspectives of MPDSR, training and mentorship, and community engagement. Major barriers included lack of organizational readiness, staff commitment, financial and resource constraints, culture of assigning responsibility b, time constraints of staff, weaknesses in MPDSR processes, and limited participation of community representatives in reviews. Identifying factors that influence the implementation of MPDSR in health facilities is important for understanding why or why not data collected from MPDSR is used effectively to prevent maternal and perinatal deaths and the constraints that limit the full adoption of Tanzanian national guidelines.

Keywords: Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, Data and Methods, Mortality and Longevity

See extended abstract.