Building on 12+ years of research and collaboration the Safer Births Bundle of Care program was co-developed in Tanzania. It was awarded US$4.5 million in funding from Global Financing Facility, a division of the World Bank, to scale-up from 1 hospital to 30 hospitals. Due to the promising preliminary results of the program’s first phase, it was awarded a further US$8.5 million. This additional funding has supported the scale-up to 150+ health facilities in five regions across Tanzania, reaching thousands of healthcare providers.
What is the Safer Births Bundle of Care program?
The Safer Births Bundle of Care program equips birth attendants with the skills and knowledge needed to manage the most common causes of maternal and neonatal mortality. It focusses on the use of regular, on-site, low-dose high-frequency training, improving the confidence and competence of healthcare workers.
The program consists of clinical innovations, training simulators and a set of solutions focussed on continuous quality improvement and sustainability.
Clinical Innovations
Training Simulators
Data collection and analysis is a key component of the program, allowing for continuous quality improvement which is essential to increase newborn and maternal survival.
Sustainability of the implementation is enabled by strong ownership from the Ministry of Health and from regular mentorship and supportive supervision of local facilitators who are trained in simulation methodology.
Original Goal
Train and equip 900 healthcare workers to save an additional 600 mothers and 5400 newborns by 2023. To date, we’ve exceeded our goal, reaching nearly 3000 healthcare workers, with the potential to save thousands of mothers and newborns.
What we hoped to achieve:
- 10% reduction in maternal deaths
- 25% reduction in fresh still births
- 50% reduction in early neonatal deaths within 24 hours
Preliminary results from the first phase of SBBC in Tanzania suggest we are exceeding these aims, with final results set to be published in 2025.
Collaborating Partners
The success of the Safer Births Bundle of Care program in Tanzania has been thanks to the strong collaborative working of many partners.
These include: Haydom Lutheran Hospital, the Tanzanian Ministries in Health (MoH and PO-RALG), the Tanzanian Midwifery Association (TAMA), the Pediatric Association of Tanzania (PAT), Stavanger University Hospital (Norway), SAFER (a simulation and implementation center based in Norway), Laerdal Global Health, and UNICEF.