Maternal and Newborn Health : Other details

Governance and management

The Working Group is led by a Secretariat hosted by Makerere University in Uganda and a Steering Committee comprised of global maternal and newborn health experts and geographically diverse site representatives.  The group aims to meet once per year linked to existing INDEPTH meetings like the Scientific Congress or Annual General Meeting. The Steering Committee meets virtually once per month.

The 2016-2020 Strategic Plan sets out vision and goals that align with the overall INDEPTH Network strategic plan, as well as the objectives and milestones identified in the Every Newborn Action Plan. The Strategic Plan may be amended following the release of the Ending Preventable Maternal Mortality metrics and measurement agenda.

 

Vision, Mission and Goals

Vision

The INDEPTH MNWG will be a platform for high quality standardized measurement for maternal and newborn health and survival across countries which is used to influence decision making, inform policies, implement programmes, and monitor and evaluate innovative solutions in low and middle-income countries.

 

Mission

The mission is to be a platform that builds the capacity of member sites to generate and disseminate high quality maternal and newborn data and innovative research in order to inform national and global strategies for maternal and newborn care in low and middle income countries. We aim to do so by being aligned with the global Every Newborn Action Plan and Ending Preventable Maternal Mortality and respective partners.

 

Goals 2016 – 2020

  • To support coordinated, multi-site  generation of evidence to inform policies and programmes for maternal and newborn health survival in the low income countries
  • Become a world leader in maternal and newborn health research and education
  • To create a network of international partners to exchange global health knowledge and skills

 

Examples of priority research questions being answered by the MNWG

  • · What is the difference in surveillance systems across sites and what impact do those differences have on pregnancy outcome capture?
  • · What are the characteristics of pregnancies that are missing from surveillance and why are they not being captured?
  • · How can community informants be better used to identify pregnancies and report births early?
  • · How do the existing hierarchies and algorithms used to categorize causes of neonatal death compare, especially relating to direct preterm deaths?
  • · What is the difference between birth history, pregnancy history, and routine surveillance in terms of capturing stillbirth and neonatal death outcomes?