The antenatal corticosteroid (ACS) implementation research project at the Center for Implementation Sciences in Health – CIS in collaboration with the ministry of health and Ethiopian society of OBGYN provided a 10-day hands on training in Batu for 15 midlevel healthcare providers (midwives, nurses, and health officers) on limited obstetric ultrasound. During the training the trainees conducted ultrasound scan for 181 pregnant women who were at their first, second or third trimester in their pregnancy (~12 per trainee).
The training will be followed by post training weekly mentorship and supervision visits for three months, midterm and final knowledge and skills evaluation of the trainees. The training combined with the ultrasound scan machines that will be provided to the facilities will enhance the capacity of the facilities to expand access to early ultrasound scan service to pregnant mothers who would not otherwise get the service.
The ACS implementation research is a multi-country collaborative research project coordinated by the World Health Organization. It has two phases. Phase one aims to develop an optimized implementation model that can achieve a high population level coverage of safe ACS use (70%) and phase two aims to scale up the optimized implementation model and evaluate its impact on coverage of safe ACS use and neonatal outcomes.
