Consultation pour la réalisation d’enquêtes de base sur les connaissances, les attitudes et les pratiques (CAP) et l’amélioration de la résilience des communautés rurales en matière de santé en Libye.

Consultation pour la réalisation d’enquêtes de base sur les connaissances, les attitudes et les pratiques (CAP) et l’amélioration de la résilience des communautés rurales en matière de santé en Libye.

Project Overview

Improving the health resilience of rural communities in Libya program is consortium program to be implemented by CARE Germany (Lead consortium agency), ACF, in Rural Tripoli and Sabha. The project aims at improving Primary and specialist Sexual, Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn and Child health (SRMNCAH) services, and community-based activism and accountability to increase the health outcomes and resilience of vulnerable rural communities in Libya. This program was design to revive back the collapsing health systems in Libya after Arab spring that led to a total non-existence of basic primary health care system for the vulnerable communities affecting women and girls and this has also compromised other services like SRH, awareness and messaging of health information’s, quality rights service provision, information systems for tracking diseases, accountability platforms and hence sustainability of the health service providers.

The project targets 7 health facilities in two municipalities and will be working with Municipal authorities who will be the grass roots administration under which the PHCC are managed. The program will seek to achieve following outcomes:

• Increased availability of rehabilitated and capacitated primary health services in rural areas that meet basic standards and provides an enhanced model of SRMNCAH quality of care and referrals for women, girls and people with disabilities.
• Increased availability, access to clean, safe delivery, life-saving emergency obstetric and newborn care (EmoNC), and other critical services for women and girls in rural areas
• Vulnerable women, girls and other marginalized groups have improved health behaviours and self-reliance, social capital is strengthened, and households and communities show greater support for gender equality and can had better withstand shocks.
• Primary and specialist services (public and private) are more responsive to needs of vulnerable members of rural communities, and communities more actively engage, support, and hold these services accountable.
• Health authorities provide sufficient and sustainable allocation of resources for SRMNCAH services, are more resilient and institutionalize care in rural communities.

The project has conducted some initial assessments to inform project design. ACF conducted a rapid health facility assessment in 2022 to help select health facilities for intervention and accordingly proceeded an in-depth WASH assessment in the selected PHCCs to launch the rehabilitation works by the end of 2022. This was conducted in coordination with PHCC administrators to gather more informative information about the equipment needs and rehabilitation.

CARE conducted a rapid gender analysis in summer of 2022 to understand the different needs, capacities and coping strategies of women, men, boys and girls in rural Tripoli and Sabha in relation to health needs and to identify key issues contributing to gender inequalities, many of which also contribute to poor RMNCAH outcomes.

Consultancy Objective

CARE seeks a consultant to conduct a baseline study for the Improving the Health Resilience of Rural Communities in Libya project. This study will include three components:

1. A health facility assessment to evaluate the current conditions of health facilities in providing quality primary and specialist RMNCAH services.
2. A population-based survey to understand barriers and factors (e.g., knowledge, behaviours, social norms, etc.) influencing women’s, girls’ and people living with disabilities’ access to and use of primary health information and services, especially RMNCAH.
3. A desk review of RMNCAH protocols & norms for service delivery

The overall objective of the survey is to assess the current situations of Rural health systems in Libya, services provided, SRH services availability, accessibility and uptake by the local vulnerable reproductive age women and young populations, to assess their current knowledge and attitude towards sexual and reproductive health and rights, and to identify socio-economic and cultural factors affecting the access to reproductive health services among women and young people. Furthermore, as a reference, relevant protocols will be considered in the baseline (RMNCHAH) and assess the relevance in relation to the reproductive health program to be implemented and provide recommendations on how to integrate the program for efficiency and effectiveness putting into consideration what other health cluster agencies are using and existing government protocols.

The project expects the following information and data to be collected and analysed in this baseline survey.

• Secondary data from the health statistics at country level on service uptake or utilization on the following reproductive health services including maternal health, family planning, STIs/HIV, for the reproductive age women and young people in rural Tripoli and Sabha.
• The information, knowledge, behaviour, attitude toward sexual and reproductive health and rights among women of reproductive age and adolescent girls in Rural Tripoli and Sabha and their access to services.
• Quality of the current local and municipal level health systems service provision (at PHCC) and sexual and reproductive health services provided for the reproductive age women and adolescent girls and referral systems in place for the targeted PHCC’s for women with health complications.
• Availability of basic health services and accessibility to different health services and provision of sexual and reproductive health services, specifically in aspects of SRMNCAH to reproductive age women and young people in rural vulnerable populations.
• An indication of the number of births occurring outside of medical facilities due to a lack of access or legal status. Data precision is essential for identifying specific locations and obtaining precise figures.
• Availability of continuous supply chain on essential medicine to PHCCs, method of accountability and administration of institutions and existing community governance and accountability for sustainability of drug supply.

In order to gain a better understanding of the project based on the baseline data, it is necessary to collect, analyse, and report the key indicators with the consultant. The following are the survey’s key indicators:

• # Of women, men, girls, boys, and people with disabilities who have access to primary health service in target communities
• # Of women and girls who have access to basic and lifesaving RMNCAH services at primary care level in target communities.
• % Of women and girls from marginalized groups (adolescents at increased risk, people with disabilities) in target communities who have access to PHCC service on reproductive health.
• # Of people who get involved in accountability and better governance of the PHCC as stakeholders

Baseline values for those indicators be estimated and provided in the report and measurement should be done to a measurable figure and reflect the true information on level of services provided at health facilities, linkage of PHCC to Central government and community involvement on sustainability of the existing health facilities.

Main tasks and scope

• Conduct desk review – Review existing national technical guidelines or SOPs for the above-mentioned health resilience program focusing on SRHMNCAH services, access to clean, safe delivery, life-saving emergency obstetric,
• Responses of public and private health facilities on special services, and accountability of health authorities on sustainability of supported facilities.
• Review core national/local statistic data about the above-mentioned health services
• Review the existing health statistics/indicators that are regularly collected at PHCC/PHCI, reported through health information system, and collect the list of project baseline indicators.
• Review ACF HFA and CARE RGA and any other data collected by project.
• Review the project logframe and develop a protocol (methodology and tools) for HFA and population-based survey including sampling and data collection method based on basic data on the target population who are the rural communities in Rural Tripoli and Sabha.
• Develop data collection tools: This should be finalized with CARE Germany before putting into action and this should be tailored to the indicators of the project as per the logframe.
• Conduct on-spot survey – Work with the local project-implementing partner to conduct the survey and ensure the whole process of data collection is culture/language appropriate and confidentiality secured way. The consultant should also coordinate with MoH and the PHCC to understand the actual situation of the systems in Rural Tripoli and Sabha in coordination with the target communities.
• Analyse data and generate report.
• Write baseline survey report: Develop a report with clear analysis covering the SRHMNCAH services quality, referral systems, data collection and storage system, quality of delivery services, governance and accountability and gender participation and decision making on service gap (mainly from perspective of services seekers/up takers) among reproductive age women, SRHR knowledge, attitude and behaviours and socio-economic and cultural factors affecting the access to reproductive health services among women and young people.
• Get feedback on the report from key stakeholders and modify the report as needed.

Requirements

The organization is looking of a professional institute with experts on health resilience projects with following qualifications:

• Extensive academia experiences in quantitative research on sexual and reproductive health, on maternal and child health, family planning, gynaecology, E HIV, breast cancer and cervical cancer, health education and communication.
• Experience of working with minority populations.
• Well understanding of local ethnic culture/norms in project areas about sexual and reproductive health rights and being gender sensitive.
• Proven in-depth understanding and consulting experiences on institutional set-up of complex development programs on health resilience.
• Substantive knowledge of participatory monitoring and evaluation processes and experience with multi-stakeholder/community development interventions on reproductive health.