Congratulations to our November 2011 grantees:
Project Concern International
World Education-Bantwana Initiative
Esperança, Inc
Institute for Healthcare Improvement, South Africa
Project Overview
The Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) was awarded a two year $160,000 grant from the Izumi Foundation to strengthen the health systems (specifically, chronic care delivery systems) in the Ekurhuleni Municipal Department of Health in Gauteng province, South Africa through the application of modern quality improvement practices. Although Ekurhuleni’s population receives its health care from both the private (~20%) and public (~80%) sectors, this intervention is directed at the public sector. It will involve six hospitals and 83 clinics, which are administered by a combination of municipal authorities (which provide mainly preventive services) and provincial authorities (which provide mainly curative services). Broad improvement will occur through application of modern Quality Improvement methods, including the Chronic Care Model, which has been used in developing countries to provide reliable and efficient care for non-communicable and communicable diseases. Because IHI aims to achieve this result with minimal addition of external resources, this prototype for health systems strengthening should provide a low-cost model that can be widely disseminated across the health systems of developing nations.
Overall Goal
The project will profoundly and permanently strengthen Ekurhuleni District’s health care delivery system by significantly enhancing chronic care and associated patient outcomes in the district's hospitals and clinics over a two-year period.
Mano a Mano International Partners, Bolivia
Project Overview
Mano a Mano was awarded its second one year grant from the Izumi Foundation in the amount of $90,000 to construct health clinics in two rural Bolivian communities and bring them into full operation. The clinics will be staffed by a full time physician and full-time nurse. Each clinic will be officially recognized by the Bolivian government as the source of health care in its catchment area, becoming eligible for staff funding, vaccines, medications and items that government-operated clinics receive. Within three years, clinics will be financially independent of Mano a Mano and community leaders will have learned to operate them. Mano a Mano will continue to provide medical supervision and continuing education over the long-term to ensure that the quality of care remains high. They will also continue to provide supplies and equipment to these clinics at no charge to them.
Overall Goal
The project will improve the health status and therefore, the quality of life for Bolivian communities in which the average family lives on less than $1.00 per day. This will be done by decreasing maternal mortality, improving infant and child survival rates, and making family planning information available to women of reproductive age.
Meds and Food for Kids, Haiti
Project Overview
MFK was awarded its fourth one year grant from the Izumi Foundation in the amount of $75,000 to pursue new customers for Medika Mamba throughout Haiti. These customers will include small church-run programs, small and large NGOs and groups which treat malnutrition in clinics or orphanages or schools. The actual malnourished person will never pay for MM and is not a potential customer. The organization initially receives the MM and the training in its use for free, with Izumi funding. After the organization uses MM and sees its potential to save lives at home, renew vigor and prevent future infections, the organization will use their unique fundraising networks to raise funding for continuing the MM malnutrition program at their facilities. These new “orders” for MM, sold only to organizations, never to malnourished clients, at slightly below cost will build a network of high quality malnutrition clinics across Haiti, draw in funding from many sources unknown to and inaccessible to MFK and provide predictability for production of MM by MFK and economies of scale, thus lowering the price for what MFK donates and for the customers.
Overall Goal
The project will expand the number of health clinics receiving Medika Mamba throughout Haiti, thus spreading the technology and knowledge of the miracle of MM, and, via economies of scale, will provide a more sustainable future for MFK‘s production facility in Cap Haitian, Haiti.
Malaria Consortium, Ethiopia – Grant Amended
Project Overview
Malaria Consortium was awarded a one-year grant of $40,921 to support development of a map of malaria risk for Oromia Regional State in Ethiopia, alongside an existing project covering several operational research activities. Laboratory technicians from the Ethiopian Health and Nutrition Research Institute, the national reference laboratory, will receive training in a new technique to determine an individual's exposure to malaria, by detecting antibodies to the Plasmodium parasite. Malaria transmission in Ethiopia is temporally and spatially variable, and it is difficult to measure the extent of malaria infection using cross-sectional surveys and standard microscopy methods. The enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) method can be used to identify areas where malaria transmission is taking place, generating information that can then be used to target delivery of interventions such as insecticide-treated mosquito nets and indoor residual spraying. The ELISA method will be used to test blood samples collected from 18,000 children during integrated surveys of malaria and helminth infection across Oromia in 2009. Results will be used to identify hot spots of malaria transmission in Oromia, as well as to model the risk of infection according to environmental conditions such as altitude, rainfall and temperature for the development of a predictive risk map. The map can be used to target interventions to all 'at-risk' locations, and also to monitor changes in malaria transmission over time as control activities are scaled up by the Federal Ministry of Health.
Overall Goal
The overall goal of this project is to train Ethiopian technicians in a serological method for evaluating individuals' exposures to malaria parasites, which can be used in future national surveillance surveys to monitor malaria transmission. A map of malaria risk for Oromia Regional State based on serology results will be prepared to allow targeting of interventions to people at risk in Oromia, and to monitor the effectiveness of these interventions.
Project Overview
Malaria Consortium was awarded a one year $44,991 grant to support an integrated malaria-worm control project alongside an already funded malaria control project, targeting at least 30 health facilities in Hoima and Kibaale districts in Uganda. Following a baseline assessment, pregnant women will be provided with intermittent preventive treatment (IPT) and long-lasting insecticidal nets (LLIN) for malaria plus the anthelmintic albendazole through routine antenatal services. School-age children will be routinely provided with albendazole when attending health facilities for other conditions or with their mothers attending ANC services. In areas endemic for schistosomiasis, the anthelminthic praziquantel will be added to above intervention package. Integrated malaria and worm control will initially be of direct benefit to approximately 20,000 outpatients and 100 health workers in the two target districts. A package of intervention measures to improve health worker performance, including job aides, external supervisory process, and a scheme for performance assessment and feedback, will also be developed. This package will both help ensure that the malaria and worm interventions are effectively provided and help strengthen the health system at the local level. A health facility assessment will be conducted after one year to evaluate the operational feasibility of the intervention. Based on these findings the intervention will be scaled up to all health.
Overall Goal
The project will contribute to a reduction in morbidity in pregnant women and children by establishing a routine health facility-based delivery approach for integrated malaria and worm control in western Uganda. This will help prompt long-term sustainability of integrated control in rural areas of Uganda.