Family Participatory Care (FPC)
28-Jul-2017: Operational Guidelines for Planning and Implementation of Family Participatory Care
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare recently released Operational Guidelines for Planning and Implementation of Family Participatory Care (FPC) for improving newborn health. The guidelines will serve as a guiding document for those intending to introduce FPC in their facility as an integral part of facility based newborn care. The document also provides details of infrastructure, training, role of health care providers and steps in the operationalization of FPC in the newborn care unit. The operational guidelines of FPC are for all stakeholders involved in the process of planning and delivering newborn care.
The guidelines also addresses various aspects of attitudes, infrastructural modifications and practice that will help in establishing FPC at Special Newborn Care Units (SNCU) such as sensitization of State and District Managers on FPC, prioritization of SNCUs for initiating FPC, making required infrastructural enhancement in SNCU, creating family participatory care environment in SNCU, ensuring availability of supplies for parents-attendants, training of SNCU staff for SNCU, role of healthcare providers for FPC implementation and institutional support for FPC.
Under FPC, the capacities of parents-attendants are built in newborn care through a structured training programme (audio -visual module and a training guide). The staff at newborn care unit will provide continuous supervision and support. Provisions for infrastructure and logistics strengthening required for implementing FPC are ensured in the annual state Program Implementation Plan (PIP). The guidelines will be shared with the States for implementation and it is expected that these guidelines when implemented by States would further improve the quality of care being provided in the SNCUs across the country.
Sick and newborn are highly vulnerable and require careful nurturing in order to survive the neonatal period and first year of life. Under National Health Mission, more than 700 state of the art Special Newborn Care Units (SNCU) have been established across the country to provide 24 X 7 comprehensive care to the newborns by dedicated trained staff.
In the recent years, it is realized that if parents are trained, during the stay of their babies in the hospital, to provide supportive care to their sick and newborns, it will help in not only improving survival of the babies after discharge but will also provide for psycho-social and developmental needs of the newborn. In this regard, Family Participatory Care has emerged as an important concept of health care which provides for partnership between health care staff and families in care of sick newborns admitted in the SNCU.
Microbial Keratitis
8-Jun-2017: CCMB develops a novel drug-delivery system for treating keratitis eye infection
Scientists at the Hyderabad-based CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CSIR-CCMB) have developed a novel way to treat fungal keratitis.
Treating keratitis infection is currently a challenge because it is difficult to maintain a therapeutic dose at the corneal surface for long periods as blinking and tear formation washes off the drug. To address this challenge, scientists have developed protein-based nanoparticles that encapsulate the drug.
Certain antibodies get attached to the outer surface of the nanoparticles, thus anchoring the nanoparticles to the corneal surface. The infected cornea expresses a set of receptors (TLR4) when infection sets in. Scientists have used antibodies to these receptors to anchor the nanoparticles to the cornea.
If the infection is severe, more receptors are expressed on the cornea and more nanoparticles get bound to the receptors. Since they are bound, the residence time in the eye is long; neither blinking nor tear formation washes off the nanoparticles. The enzymes secreted by fungi breaks down the gelatine protein of nanoparticles that encapsulates the drug, thus releasing the drug. Like in the case of the receptors, more enzyme is secreted when infection is severe leading to more drug being released from the nanoparticles. The gelatine protein acts as an alternative nutrient for the fungi. The fungi also degrade the gelatine-based nanoparticle to derive nutrients thus minimising the damage to the corneal tissue. In the process it releases the drug. In a sense, the fungi are committing suicide by consuming the gelatine protein.
Vatsalya – Maatri Amrit Kosh
7-Jun-2017: National Human Milk Bank and Lactation Counselling Centre Inaugurated.
‘Vatsalya – Maatri Amrit Kosh’, a National Human Milk Bank and Lactation Counselling Centre is inaugurated at the Lady Hardinge Medical College (LHMC). This would be the largest human milk bank and lactation counselling centre available under the public sector in North India. It is envisaged that with this donor human milk bank, all newborns in and around Delhi will have access to life saving human milk regardless of the circumstances of their birth.
“Vatsalya – Maatri Amrit Kosh” opened at Lady Hardinge Medical College in collaboration with the Norwegian government, Oslo University and Norway India Partnership Initiative (NIPI) Newborn Project, is a national human milk bank and lactation counseling centre that will collect, pasteurize, test and safely store milk that has been donated by lactating mothers and make it available for infants in need. In addition, this facility will protect, promote and support breastfeeding of their own healthy mothers by providing lactation support to mothers through dedicated lactation counsellors. This project will not only act as a dedicated centre to support breastfeeding and improve infant survival but also act as the teaching, training and demonstration site for other milk banks to be established under the Ministry Of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India.
Even when we know the potential of mother’s milk for a child, breastfeeding rates are low in India. Early initiation of breastfeeding is only 40%, even when the institutional delivery has increased to 78.9%. “In view of this, Mothers Absolute Affection (MAA) programme has been launched to create awareness regarding breastfeeding as being the most cost-effective way of enhancing the child’s immunity.
The decline in maternal and child mortality in India is much faster than the global average rate of decline and the frontline workers need appreciation for their dedicated work. We are poised to enhance Universal Health Coverage in the country and are conscious of quality issues. Several efforts are underway through NHM to improve affordability, quality and access to healthcare services.