The director of global women’s health at New York University College of Global Public Health, Dr. Tara Shirazian, learned this week that her Community Case Study manuscript, “How a Training Program in Rural Guatemala is Transforming the Role of Traditional Birth Attendants from Cultural Practitioners to Unique Healthcare Providers”, has been accepted for publication in the Public Health Education and Promotion section of the journal, Frontiers in Public Health.
Frontiers in Public Health is a peer-review journal aimed towards the scientific community and is interested in the broad sphere of public health. It provides an international multidisciplinary forum with a holistic approach to public health issues, health and medicine, health and social policy, service aspects, developmental aspects, epidemiology, rehabilitation, family and social issues, quality of life and all other aspects of public health over the whole age spectrum.
There has been recognition of the importance of training traditional birth attendants (TBAs) to help improve outcomes during pregnancy and childbirth especially in low and middle income countries (LMICs). The case study by Dr. Shirazian presents a unique education program led by TBAs to help other TBAs in rural Guatemala. The program focuses on efficient methods to increase access to health care for women in LMICs by focusing on programming implementation, curriculum development, sustainable methodology, and how an educational partnership with the current national health care system. The training program has really shown that Guatemalan TBAs are able to improve their basic obstetrical knowledge, are capable of identifying and referring early complications of pregnancy and labor, and can deliver basic pre-natal care that would otherwise not be provided. Through this model, the role of a TBA shifts from a sole cultural practitioner to a validated healthcare provider within the healthcare infrastructure of Guatemala and has the potential to do the same in other LMICs.
Read more about the training program at, http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpubh.2017.00111/full