By Helen Keller Intl
For nearly 10 years, Boncapri Sesay has served as a peer educator, providing counseling and guidance to pregnant and breastfeeding women in her own community. Regularly hosting a group that meets under a mango tree in her rural village in Sierra Leone’s Northern Province, she is keen to share her knowledge about the special health and nutrition issues that affect mothers and babies.
In recent months, when discussing a woman’s extra nutritional needs during pregnancy, the 55-year-old grandmother of seven has been excited to tell attendees about a powerful means of helping them safeguard their own health – multiple micronutrient supplements, also known as prenatal vitamins.
“These supplements help prevent low birth weight, premature birth, and maternal complications. They ensure a safer pregnancy and give your baby a healthier start,” she explains while holding up a bottle of tablets.
Lifesaving Nutrients for Moms and Babies
Boncapri leads regular mothers group meetings in her community in Sierra Leone.
With 15 essential vitamins and minerals, these multiple micronutrient supplements are more effective in helping mothers maintain their health than older supplements that contained only iron and folic acid. That’s because the new prenatal vitamins, while formulated to support a healthy pregnancy, also provide critical nutrients for mothers who are under- or malnourished. This can be truly lifesaving, both for them and their newborns.
Malnourished mothers face an increased risk of high blood pressure, pre-eclampsia, and excessive bleeding during childbirth. Their babies are also more likely to be born prematurely or to be underweight. In those cases, the children’s risks of dying before their first birthday and of experiencing stunted growth and development are greatly increased.
Ensuring that pregnant women receive good nutrition care, including multiple micronutrient supplementation, is especially important in Sierra Leone, a country that has some of the highest rates of maternal and infant mortality due to malnutrition. That’s why Helen Keller Intl has partnered with the Ministry of Health, with support from Vitamin Angels and Kirk Humanitarian, to expand access to these prenatal vitamins in 1,400 health facilities — at no cost to women or their families.
Reaching Women with Prenatal Vitamins Boncapri provides one-on-one counseling to Rugiatu, a first-time mother.
Boncapri learned about the supplements at a nearby district health facility through sponsored community outreach efforts. Now that she and other community health heroes have been trained to provide education services and distribute the vitamins locally, 100,000 pregnant women across Sierra Leone have been reached in just the past year, including those living in the most remote areas.
During a recent mothers’ group meeting, Boncapri explains once again that the new supplements have been developed specifically to meet the increased nutritional needs of pregnant women. In fact, she emphasizes, they provide a wider range of essential micronutrients than the previous pregnancy regimen of iron-folic-acid. As always, she gives the women an opportunity to discuss the new information, ask questions, and voice any concerns they may have.
As the group disperses, Boncapri makes a point of spending extra time with a 19-year-old named Rugiatu Dumbuya, who is pregnant with her first child. Part of Boncapri’s role as peer educator is providing one-on-one home sessions for all first-time mothers. These women are likely to need additional support, including information about nutrition, reproductive health, and other aspects of a healthy pregnancy.
Boncapri is pleased to hear Rugiatu share that she has felt better since she began taking the new prenatal supplement. “It has improved my appetite quite a bit, and I sleep more comfortably now,” Rugiatu says with a smile.
Source; Championing Prenatal Vitamins in Sierra Leone – Helen Keller Intl