Browsing by Author "Kapito-Tembo, Atupele"

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    Designing immunization interventions in urban settings to improve EPI coverage in under-five children using human-centred design thinking approach: A sub-study
    (Kamuzu University of Health Sciences, 2021-03-17) Kapito-Tembo, Atupele
    Type of Study: Cross-sectional sub-study using qualitative human-centred design thinking methods. Background: The Malawi Ministry of Health (MOH) Expanded program on Immunisation (EPI) program would like to develop a national urban immunization strategy. Prior background work is currently underway including analysis of program data, review of EPI program activities and research studies to inform development of the urban immunization strategy. The College of Medicine (COM) team is conducting one of the research studies to inform the strategy. The study aims to identify factors contributing to low or incomplete immunization in under-five children in urban settings and strategies that could address existing challenges. Preliminary study findings have identified some proposed strategies that have potential to improve immunization services in the urban settings in Malawi. However, there is further need and request by the immunization program implementers and policy makers to develop the proposed strategies into intervention packages that meet the needs of the urban population as well as the health services providers. Main objective: To design immunization interventions to improve vaccine uptake and coverage in under-five children targeting urban settings using human-centred design thinking approach. Methods: We propose to conduct a cross-sectional sub-study using human-centred design thinking methods to design immunization interventions for the urban settings. Human-centred design thinking is a process of creating and testing innovative ideas to improve a service or product or to solve existing problems with inputs from clients who will use the service or product. We will use the human-centred design thinking process framework that uses the following 6 steps: understand, observe, point of view, ideate, prototype and test. In the first 5 steps, we will interview and work with the following target urban groups or participants to design immunization interventions that would meet their needs: a) Child caregivers with under-five children including those with under-immunised children targeting groups such as working parents, small-scale or vending business operators, highly/tertiary educated and Indian community b) Males or husbands with under-five children and sc) health care workers. In the last step of the design thinking process, we will test the developed interventions from first stage with different participants from same population categories to validate and refine the developed intervention packages. For each target group, we will engage atmost 5 participants. The study will be conducted in urban areas of Blantyre district. We will work with the HSAs to guide the identification of the communities and target groups in their catchments areas. The final interventions products created with the participants will be presented to the key EPI stakeholders for their inputs. Expected findings and dissemination: We expect to develop immunization interventions tailored for urban settings that will contribute towards informing the national urban immunization strategy. In addition, this information may guide implementers and policy makers on the areas requiring improvement in the EPI service delivery to increase uptake and coverage in urban areas. It is planned that the findings from this study will be shared with College of Medicine Research and Ethics Committee, MOH and presented at college, national and/or international research dissemination conferences and will be published in peer-reviewed journals.