Komi Gle is the Director of Planning and Development for Golfe 1 Municipality.
The Grand Lomé Health Region recently hosted an impactful workshop to assess its family planning (FP) program in partnership with The Challenge Initiative (TCI). This event was a significant milestone, bringing together key stakeholders to review and analyze FP program data under the theme “Data for Decision-Making.”
Participants included representatives from municipalities, the healthcare system, and community, religious, and traditional leaders. The workshop’s primary objectives were to reflect on the implementation of FP activities with TCI, discuss challenges encountered, and plan future actions.
The workshop began with presentations from the Grand Lomé Health Districts, providing a thorough overview of their collaborative activities with TCI. They openly discussed their achievements, challenges, and future prospects. TCI also presented critical findings from Lomé, including methodologies for estimating the impact of FP usage, financial data, and assessment results using checklists.
Despite significant progress in implementing the family planning program, the data analysis revealed some critical insights. There was a notable decline in additional FP client numbers in the last quarter, underperformance of healthcare facilities in checklist evaluations, and financial mobilization was below expectations. Visual data clearly highlighted these challenges.
Additional clients by month in the city of Lomé – March to December 2023.
Group discussions following the presentations gave participants an opportunity to identify obstacles and formulate recommendations. It became clear that revising the list of private facilities to include those providing FP services and ensuring they transmit monthly data was essential. Discussions also pointed out the inadequacy of the current method of working with community health workers through private facilities in Lomé.
Key challenges identified included delays in municipal fund planning, leading to low financial commitments, and insufficient implementation of FP Special Days that were previously supported by the now-concluded Amplify FP project.
The recommendations from the workshop were comprehensive. Participants emphasized the need for tools to systematically identify client needs in healthcare facilities, coordination meetings organized by prefects, and greater involvement of Health Center Management Committees. Advocacy tours for local resource mobilization will be organized in municipalities with TCI’s support. Additionally, district supervision tools will integrate TCI’s high-impact interventions. Komi Gle, Director of Planning and Development for Golfe 1 Municipality, noted:
This performance review workshop was beneficial in fostering emulation among municipalities and enhancing the health system’s understanding of municipal operations and challenges, with a view to adapting resource mobilization strategies.
This workshop was a crucial step in continuously improving family planning programs in the region, highlighting the importance of a data-driven approach for informed decision-making and more effective actions. As the sun set on Lomé, it marked the dawn of a new era of empowered decision-making, fueled by data, insights, and collaboration.
