Publication:
Community Perceptions on Malaria and Care-Seeking Practices in Endemic Indian Settings: Policy Implications for the Malaria Control Programme

Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Files in English
Journal Article (527.54 KB)
268 downloads
Published
2013-01-29
ISSN
Date
2015-11-30
Author(s)
Das, Ashis
Das Gupta, R.K.
Pradhan, Madan M.
Mohapatra, Charu C.
Editor(s)
Abstract
The focus of India’s National Malaria Programme witnessed a paradigm shift recently from health facility to community-based approaches. The current thrust is on diagnosing and treating malaria by community health workers and prevention through free provision of long-lasting insecticidal nets. However, appropriate community awareness and practice are inevitable for the effectiveness of such efforts. In this context, the study assessed community perceptions and practice on malaria and similar febrile illnesses. This evidence base is intended to direct the roll-out of the new strategies and improve community acceptance and utilization of services.
Link to Data Set
Digital Object Identifier
Associated content
Report Series
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue

Related items

Showing items related by metadata.

  • Publication
    Strengthening Malaria Service Delivery through Supportive Supervision and Community Mobilization in an Endemic Indian Setting : An Evaluation of Nested Delivery Models
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-06) Das, Ashis; Friedman, Jed; Kandpal, Eeshani; Ramana, GNV; Das Gupta, R K; Pradhan, Madan M; Govindaraj, Ramesh
    Malaria continues to be a prominent global public health challenge, in part because of the slow population adoption of recommended preventive and curative behaviors. This paper tests the effectiveness of two service delivery models designed to promote recommended behaviors, including prompt treatment seeking for febrile illness, in Odisha India. The tested modules include supportive supervision of community health workers and community mobilization promoting appropriate health seeking. Program effects were identified through a randomized cluster trial comprising 120 villages from two purposively chosen malaria-endemic districts. Significant improvements were measured in the reported utilization of bed nets in both intervention arms vis-à-vis the control. Although overall rates of treatment seeking were equal across the study arms, treatment seeking from community health workers was higher in both intervention arms and care seeking from trained providers also increased with a substitution away from untrained providers. Further, fever cases in both treatments were more likely to have received timely medical treatment (within 24 hours) from a skilled provider. The study arm with supportive supervision was particularly effective in shifting care seeking to community health workers and ensuring prompt diagnosis and treatment. A community-based intervention combining the supportive supervision of community health workers with intensive community mobilization can be effective in shifting care seeking and increasing preventive behavior, and thus may be used to strengthen the national malaria control program.
  • Publication
    Strengthening Malaria Service Delivery through Supportive Supervision and Community Mobilization in an Endemic Indian Setting
    (BioMed Central, 2014-12-08) Das, Ashis; Friedman, Jed; Kandpal, Eeshani; Ramana, Gandham N.V.; Das Gupta, Rudra Kumar; Pradhan, Madan M.; Govindaraj, Ramesh
    alaria continues to be a prominent global public health challenge. This study tested the effectiveness of two service delivery models for reducing the malaria burden, e.g. supportive supervision of community health workers (CHW) and community mobilization in promoting appropriate health-seeking behaviour for febrile illnesses in Odisha, India. The study population comprised 120 villages from two purposively chosen malaria-endemic districts, with 40 villages randomly assigned to each of the two treatment arms, one with both supportive supervision and community mobilization and one with community mobilization alone, as well as an observational control arm. Outcome measures included changes in the utilization of bed nets and timely care-seeking for fever from a trained provider compared to the control group. Analysis was by intention-to-treat.
  • Publication
    Does Involvement of Local NGOs Enhance Public Service Delivery? Cautionary Evidence from a Malaria-Prevention Evaluation in India
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-06) Das, Ashis; Friedman, Jed; Kandpal, Eeshani
    Using data from an experimental supportive intervention to India's malaria control program, this paper studies the impact of leveraging local non-state capacity to promote mosquito net usage and recommended fever care-seeking patterns. The supportive activities were conducted simultaneously by three nongovernmental organizations in two endemic districts in the state of Orissa. The study finds that program impact varied significantly by location. Examining three potential sources of this variation (differential population characteristics, differential health worker characteristics, and differential implementer characteristics), the analysis provides evidence that both population and nongovernmental organization characteristics significantly affected the success of the program. The paper discusses these findings as they relate to the external validity of development policy evaluations and, specifically, for the ability of the health system to benefit from limited non-state capacity in under-resourced areas.
  • Publication
    Health Information, Treatment, and Worker Productivity : Experimental Evidence from Malaria Testing and Treatment among Nigerian Sugarcane Cutters
    (World Bank Group, Washington, DC, 2014-11) Dillon, Andrew; Friedman, Jed; Serneels, Pieter
    Agricultural and other physically demanding sectors are important sources of growth in developing countries but prevalent diseases such as malaria adversely impact the productivity, labor supply, and choice of job tasks among workers by reducing physical capacity. This study identifies the impact of malaria on worker earnings, labor supply, and daily productivity by randomizing the temporal order at which piece-rate workers at a large sugarcane plantation in Nigeria are offered malaria testing and treatment. The results indicate a significant and substantial intent to treat effect of the intervention -- the offer of a workplace-based malaria testing and treatment program increases worker earnings by approximately 10 percent over the weeks following the offer. The study further investigates the effect of health information by contrasting program effects by workers' revealed health status. For workers who test positive for malaria, the treatment of illness increases labor supply, leading to higher earnings. For workers who test negative, and especially for those workers most likely to be surprised by the healthy diagnosis, the health information also leads to increased earnings via increased productivity. Possible mechanisms for this response include selection into higher return tasks within the plantation as a result of changes in the perceived cost of effort. A model of the worker labor decision that allows health expectations partly to determine the supply of effort suggests that, in endemic settings with poor quality health services, inaccurate health perceptions may lead workers to suboptimal labor allocation decisions. The results underline the importance of medical treatment, but also of access to improved information about one's health status, as the absence of either may lead workers to deliver lower effort in lower return jobs.
  • Publication
    The Contribution of Traditional Herbal Medicine Practitioners to Kenyan Health Care Delivery : Results from Community Health-seeking Behavior Vignettes and a Traditional Herbal Medicine Practitioner Survey
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2011-09) Lambert, John; Leonard, Kenneth; Mungai, Geoffrey; Omindi-Ogaja, Elizabeth; Gatheru, Gladys; Mirangi, Mirangi; Owara, Jennifer; Herbst, Christopher H.; Ramana, GNV; Lemiere, Christophe
    This study examines the role that Traditional Herbal Medicine Practitioners (THMPs) play in Kenya in the context of its human resources for health crisis. Two surveys were carried out to obtain evidence. The first documented the choices and perceptions of households in 36 communities on seeking medical assistance for eight common illnesses. The second survey asked 258 THMPs in five provinces to identify their knowledge sources, training, common illnesses treated, forms of payment, challenges, and concerns. Community-derived data show that households make reasonable decisions when faced with difficult circumstances: they prefer hospitals when these are affordable and seek care at clinics and health centers when hospitals are too far away. There is significant self-care and use of pharmacies, although THMPs are preferred for worms and lower respiratory problems. In general, THMPs provide an important though diminishing role in the provision of health care; they are not sought out in situations when inadequate care is dangerous, specifically infant diarrhoea and potential TB. Whilst Human Resources for Health (HRH) policies are urgently required to strengthen the conventional health workforce and increase their accessibility for the poor, policies should not ignore the findings from this study: many of the rural poor currently receive services from a traditional health workforce not linked to, or regulated by, the national government. This paper argues that formal recognition of their role by the government and by the conventional medical associations, and a targeted strategy to strengthen and build on the positive qualities evident in many traditional medicine practices may be beneficial to safeguarding the well-being of the poor.

Users also downloaded

Showing related downloaded files

  • Publication
    Lebanon Economic Monitor, Fall 2022
    (Washington, DC, 2022-11) World Bank
    The economy continues to contract, albeit at a somewhat slower pace. Public finances improved in 2021, but only because spending collapsed faster than revenue generation. Testament to the continued atrophy of Lebanon’s economy, the Lebanese Pound continues to depreciate sharply. The sharp deterioration in the currency continues to drive surging inflation, in triple digits since July 2020, impacting the poor and vulnerable the most. An unprecedented institutional vacuum will likely further delay any agreement on crisis resolution and much needed reforms; this includes prior actions as part of the April 2022 International Monetary Fund (IMF) staff-level agreement (SLA). Divergent views among key stakeholders on how to distribute the financial losses remains the main bottleneck for reaching an agreement on a comprehensive reform agenda. Lebanon needs to urgently adopt a domestic, equitable, and comprehensive solution that is predicated on: (i) addressing upfront the balance sheet impairments, (ii) restoring liquidity, and (iii) adhering to sound global practices of bail-in solutions based on a hierarchy of creditors (starting with banks’ shareholders) that protects small depositors.
  • Publication
    Argentina Country Climate and Development Report
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-11) World Bank Group
    The Argentina Country Climate and Development Report (CCDR) explores opportunities and identifies trade-offs for aligning Argentina’s growth and poverty reduction policies with its commitments on, and its ability to withstand, climate change. It assesses how the country can: reduce its vulnerability to climate shocks through targeted public and private investments and adequation of social protection. The report also shows how Argentina can seize the benefits of a global decarbonization path to sustain a more robust economic growth through further development of Argentina’s potential for renewable energy, energy efficiency actions, the lithium value chain, as well as climate-smart agriculture (and land use) options. Given Argentina’s context, this CCDR focuses on win-win policies and investments, which have large co-benefits or can contribute to raising the country’s growth while helping to adapt the economy, also considering how human capital actions can accompany a just transition.
  • Publication
    World Development Report 2006
    (Washington, DC, 2005) World Bank
    This year’s Word Development Report (WDR), the twenty-eighth, looks at the role of equity in the development process. It defines equity in terms of two basic principles. The first is equal opportunities: that a person’s chances in life should be determined by his or her talents and efforts, rather than by pre-determined circumstances such as race, gender, social or family background. The second principle is the avoidance of extreme deprivation in outcomes, particularly in health, education and consumption levels. This principle thus includes the objective of poverty reduction. The report’s main message is that, in the long run, the pursuit of equity and the pursuit of economic prosperity are complementary. In addition to detailed chapters exploring these and related issues, the Report contains selected data from the World Development Indicators 2005‹an appendix of economic and social data for over 200 countries. This Report offers practical insights for policymakers, executives, scholars, and all those with an interest in economic development.
  • Publication
    Classroom Assessment to Support Foundational Literacy
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-03-21) Luna-Bazaldua, Diego; Levin, Victoria; Liberman, Julia; Gala, Priyal Mukesh
    This document focuses primarily on how classroom assessment activities can measure students’ literacy skills as they progress along a learning trajectory towards reading fluently and with comprehension by the end of primary school grades. The document addresses considerations regarding the design and implementation of early grade reading classroom assessment, provides examples of assessment activities from a variety of countries and contexts, and discusses the importance of incorporating classroom assessment practices into teacher training and professional development opportunities for teachers. The structure of the document is as follows. The first section presents definitions and addresses basic questions on classroom assessment. Section 2 covers the intersection between assessment and early grade reading by discussing how learning assessment can measure early grade reading skills following the reading learning trajectory. Section 3 compares some of the most common early grade literacy assessment tools with respect to the early grade reading skills and developmental phases. Section 4 of the document addresses teacher training considerations in developing, scoring, and using early grade reading assessment. Additional issues in assessing reading skills in the classroom and using assessment results to improve teaching and learning are reviewed in section 5. Throughout the document, country cases are presented to demonstrate how assessment activities can be implemented in the classroom in different contexts.
  • Publication
    Digital Africa
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-03-13) Begazo, Tania; Dutz, Mark Andrew; Blimpo, Moussa
    All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. "Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs" shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing, digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, it can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth. These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at least 3G mobile internet service now cover 84 percent of Africa’s population, but only 22 percent uses such services. And the average African business lags in the use of smartphones and computers as well as more sophisticated digital technologies that catalyze further productivity gains. Two issues explain the usage gap: affordability of these new technologies and willingness to use them. For the 40 percent of Africans below the extreme poverty line, mobile data plans alone would cost one-third of their incomes—in addition to the price of access devices, apps, and electricity. Data plans for small- and medium-size businesses are also more expensive than in other regions. Moreover, shortcomings in the quality of internet services—and in the supply of attractive, skills-appropriate apps that promote entrepreneurship and raise earnings—dampen people’s willingness to use them. For those countries already using these technologies, the development payoffs are significant. New empirical studies for this report add to the rapidly growing evidence that mobile internet availability directly raises enterprise productivity, increases jobs, and reduces poverty throughout Africa. To realize these and other benefits more widely, Africa’s countries must implement complementary and mutually reinforcing policies to strengthen both consumers’ ability to pay and willingness to use digital technologies. These interventions must prioritize productive use to generate large numbers of inclusive jobs in a region poised to benefit from a massive, youthful workforce—one projected to become the world’s largest by the end of this century.