Evaluation of the 5th National Program on Maternal, Child and reproductive Health / Монголын Анагаах Ухаан

Background@#As a result of the previous programmes implemented by the Government of Mongolia, maternal mortality and under-five mortality rates had declined fourfold from 1990 levels to 2015 The Millennium Development Goals (50.0), shifting from a country with a high maternal mortality rate to a country with a moderate maternal mortality rate [6, 7, 8, 9]. However, as maternal and child mortality have not been steadily declining, regional disparities in care have not been eliminated, unmet needs for family planning have increased, contraception use has reduced, abortions and repeat abortions have not decreased. The quality of antenatal care is low; the continuing challenges have led to the development and implementation of the 5^th National Programme. As the programme was finished in 2016-2020, assessing its impact on Mongolia is significant. @*Objective@#Evaluating the objectives of the National on Maternal, Child and Reproductive Health Programme, the implementation of planned activities, whether the intended results have been achieved according to the criteria was to determine future needs and the main areas of focus. @*Materials and Methods@#Quantitative and qualitative methods were used to analyse the information required for the assessment. The activities of the programme implementation plan were evaluated in the form of activities implemented in 2016-2020 and time spent on implementation, which implemented, who was involved, the budget spent, the type and the number of beneficiaries, and the reasons for nonimplementation. @*Results@#A total of 28 indicators of the National Program was 76.8 percent. In 2016, by the time the programme was launched, the under-five mortality rate was 20.8 per 1000 live births. However, the goal to reach 15 in 2021 was achieved to reach 12.7 by successfully implementing the programme. The program aimed to reduce the maternal mortality rate from 48.6 per 100000 live births to 25 per 100000 live births in 2021, but has not yet been achieved, reaching 30.2 in 2020 and 43 in the first five months of 2021. Initially, the program implementation plan included cooperation with more than 600 organisations, such as 9 ministries, 14 government organizations, 21 provinces, health centers, and maternity hospitals. However, an excessive number of organizations and an unnecessary amount of planned work made it impossible to identify the beneficiaries in addition to the Government of Mongolia, donors such as UNFPA, UNICEF, and WHO made a significant contribution to the implementation of the programme by providing financial and technical assistance. As of 2017-2021, no funds had been found to implement the National Programme on how much has been spent on information, publicity, and advocacy measures. According to the interviews with the programme implementers, a lack of leadership, lack of proper planning, turnover in the civil servants, and the ongoing pandemic had resulted in the lack of a transparent annual implementation plan, the insufficient time and resources for next year’s planning and implementation of the planned work, and the lack of budget resources. @*Conclusion@#As the total of 28 indicators of the National Programme was 76.8 percent, it has been evaluated as having achieved specific results.

Assessment of midwifery integrated competencies of midwives in Mongolia, 2016 / Монголын Анагаах Ухаан

Background@#A midwifery services are recognized as one of essential health care and services. The amplification of trained midwives plays very important role to improve the quality of and access to health care services as highlighted in the global Human Development Report [1]. Obstetric care is the integrated specialized interventions aimed to detect, monitor, manage delivery, treat and prevent illnesses of mothers, fetus and newborns in pregnancy, childbirth and postnatal periods. Every year, 287,000 women die from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth, and 2.9 million newborns die before they reach the age of four weeks worldwide. The majority of the preventable maternal and newborn deaths occur in low-income countries [3]. @*Goal@#This assessment was aimed to review the current situation and legal framework of midwifery services and comprehensive competencies of midwives, and to provide baseline data for the project as well as evidence based recommendations for further improvement of midwifery services in Mongolia. @*Materials and Methods@#In order to assess the current status of midwifery services and integrated competencies of midwives, a range of quantitative and qualitative methods were used. A cross- sectional study for assessing the quality of obstetric care and practice was conducted by using observation checklists, questionnaires and interview guides. Midwives who are providing obstetric care in Mongolia were involved in the assessment.@*Results@#A total of 321 midwives from NCMCH, and 2 maternity hospitals of Ulaanbaatar and 21 aimags were involved in the assessment. Out of them 97.2% were female and the mean age was 37.2±10.1 [95%CI: 36.03-38.21]. The mean of working years in health sector was 14.54±10.9 years and mean of working years with the current institution was 11.7±10.1 years. Minimum work experience was few months and maximum was 38 years. A majority of the assessed midwives hold some abilities sufficiently such as keeping medical documents during pregnancy [4.23; 95%CI: 4.15-4.32], educating and giving advice to the customers about after and before the pregnancy period [4.01; 95%CI: 3.91-4.11]. A majority of the assessed midwives answered holding some abilities as important, such as basic knowledge of mother and child public health care in the fertility system [4.11; 95%CI:4.00-4.21], implementing experiences [4.07; 95%CI:3.97-4.19], and very important documents for the Obstetricians Association to know about midwives’ practical and professional activity [4.05; 95%CI:3.92-4.17]. None of the midwives took “A” or point indicates highest level. 40.5 percent of assessed midwives took “D” or “Able to make a relatively easy content; Lack of general knowledge, skills and practices”. One third of participated midwives took “F” indicating lack of knowledge, skill and practice. Moreover, one fifth of the midwives took “C” indicating average level, understood most of the content, skilled moderately, and prepared enough to practice more in this field. Even though rural midwives got average level (22.0%) score 4.1 functions more than city midwives, it didn’t have any difference in the statistic correlation. 3.3 percent of all participant 7 midwives took “B” indicating above the average level in the knowledge test. The midwives have told training for them hadn’t organized frequently which is shown in the quality assessment.@*Conclusions@#Furthermore, it is necessary to increase the skill of midwives who would perform complex care based on clinical evidence to reveal the risks faced to maternal and infant health, prevent from degradation and manage safe birth.

Knowledge and attitude of women on cervical cancer risk factors, prevention and screening / Монголын Анагаах Ухаан

Introduction Cervical cancer is one of the most common types of cancer in women worldwide. It can be prevented by identifying pre-cancer lesions at early stages using Pap smear screening and treating these lesions. Knowledge and attitude on cervical cancer and Pap smear tests are associated with actual participation in cervical cancer screening. Therefore, our study aimed to investigate cervical cancer and Pap smear knowledge and attitudes among Mongolian women. Materials and Methods A total of 671 women aged 30 to 60 years from urban and rural areas participated in the study. The multiple clusters sampling method was used. We examined the relations of socio-demographic characteristics with lack of knowledge and negative attitude towards Pap smear tests by using a multilogistic regression analysis. Result The response rate was 89% (671/750). 62% of the participants correctly answered less than 4 out of 8 questions about cervical cancer risk factors. Also 47,2% and 79,3% of the total number of the women had never heard of Pap Smear and HPV. Only 16,4% of the respondents have some knowledge about them. Almost all (93%) participants agreed that there is a defficiency of information about cancer and its screening.58% and 28% of respondents said that they would participate in Pap smear tests voluntarily and agree to vaccinate their daughters. Positive attitude on Pap smear tests was higher among women living in rural areas and those who have had a Pap smear test. Conclusions Cervical cancer and Pap smear knowledge and attitude among the women in Mongolia are low. Having higher education and higher income level did not ensure positive attitude to cervical cancer screening. Strategies for communicating accurate information about cervical cancer, prevention, and detection as well as risk and treatment of cervical cancer are needed.