Making Labor and Delivery Safer for Mothers in Northern Mali

The WHO’s 2015 Safe Childbirth Checklist (SCC) provides standard data elements that inform 28 essential evidence-based birth practices to improve quality of care for women in labor. Studies show that the checklist, when used in combination with other maternal and child health interventions in many low-and middle-income countries, reduces perinatal mortality, fresh stillbirth, and 28-day newborn mortality.

Yet despite its potential, the SCC remains under-utilized in most fragile countries, where resource constraints challenge its operationalization. MOMENTUM Integrated Health Resilience project used its MAKLab for technical assistance before introducing the SCC in Northern Mali, a part of the country marked by instability and in which the project began working in 2021 to improve essential health services and the health system’s ability to respond to shocks and stresses. The 2015 version of the SCC has been in use in the southern regions of Mali with demonstrable results and is part of the national reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health standard operating procedures.

In April 2022, Ariadne Labs, a project partner and globally recognized SSC expert, provided customized training on implementing the SCC in Northern Mali. Using this support, MOMENTUM Knowledge Accelerator has reviewed the current four-part SCC and plans to produce a revised version for review and adoption by Mali’s Ministry of Health. Ariadne experts will offer regular “office hours” for project staff, supporting the implementation of the adapted SCC and troubleshooting roadblocks as they emerge in this dynamic setting.

Photo credit: Lazare Coulibaly/MOMENTUM Integrated Health Resilience