NPHCDA initiates behavioural science for PHC services

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The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) has disclosed that it has initiated behavioural science in a bid to strengthen the demand for Primary Health Care (PHC) service coverage in Nigeria.

The Executive Director of NPHCDA, Dr Faisal Shuaib in his opening remarks at the Official Close-out Ceremony of the NPHCDA-BMGF Strengthening Demand For PHC Project in Abuja, explained that the project was initiated in 2020 in partnership with the Bill and Melinda Gate Foundation (BMGF) to build on Agency’s existing PHC demand generation strategies, strengthen the capacity of SPHCDBs (including LGAs/HFs), and trusted community influencers to effectively apply modern behavioural science approaches, advocacy, and communications to sustainable PHC demand generation in a covid-impacted world.

Shuaib lamented that demand for PHC services in the country has remained sub-optimal due to reasons ranging between social, cultural and geographical barriers, poor quality of care, and low level of trust in Nigeria’s health system arising from misinformation and disinformation.

He maintained that the outbreak of COVID-19 in 2020 made the situation worse by bringing about social restrictions and heightening public distrust in the health systems.

“This impacted negatively on health-seeking behaviours, and further weight down on demand for services especially at primary health care and community levels in the country”.

“As we strove through COVID to recover demand for services using our existing structures and strategies, we were also working closely with BMGF on how we could explore behavioural science approaches and human-centred designs for more evidence-based interventions that would lead to long-term desired changes in health-seeking behaviours”.

He, therefore, disclosed that the implementation of this first stage of the project, which included funding for two years to cover start-up support in 2 states – Niger and Gombe, commenced in 2021.

“This is a little over two years since then, and I would like to commend the BUSARA Centre for behavioural economics for its exemplary leadership of the implementing consortium”.

He also commended other members of the consortium – CCSI, Solina, NTLC and, especially NPHCDA, for the excellent job they have done on this project.

He expressed confidence based on the mutually agreed milestones, that the team has made sufficient progress on stage 1 of the project, and should therefore consider taking immediate steps to develop the scale-up plan.

“It is my hope that, as envisioned in this project, its impact will provide more justifications for the institutionalizing of behavioral science in our PHC demand generation strategies from conceptualization to implementation in the future”.

Meanwhile, the Director of Community Health Services, Dr Usman Adamu, disclosed that through the project, awareness has been raised about the importance of accessing primary healthcare services and educating communities on the benefits of preventive healthcare.

He said: “We have also been able to provide training and capacity-building programs for healthcare providers and traditional leaders to improve the quality of services they offer”.

“This has resulted in a significant increase in the number of people accessing primary healthcare services, particularly in Niger and Gombe States”.

“The success of this project would not have been possible without the support and collaboration of our partners, particularly the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation”. He added.

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