Improving default rates in Ambulatory Therapeutic Feeding Programmes in operations by Médecins sans Frontières Operational Centre Amsterdam
Document type: mthesis
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Abstract:
Severe Acute Malnutrition is a serious medical condition prevalent in many areas with chronic or acute conflict. Organisations providing emergency relief in disaster-struck areas, such as Médecins sans Frontières-Operational Centre Amsterdam (MSF-OCA), have established feeding programmes in many of these countries. Since a predominantly centre-based treatment mode was replaced by an ambulatory treatment approach some of the programmes have been subject to relatively high defaulter rates. Defaulters are people who are absent from 2 or 3 scheduled weekly visits. When more than 15% of children leave the programme as defaulters the programme is generally regarded as not having an acceptable outcome. The central problem of this thesis is: how can MSF-OCA decrease its default-rates? It’s aim is to identify key factors that underlie the phenomenon of defaulting which can be addressed in the set up of Ambulatory Therapeutic Feeding Programmes and during the implementation of MSF-OCA’s new and existing programmes. Research in the topic of defaulting from feeding programmes is limited. Therefore an inventory of possible reasons for defaulting was made from the area of tuberculosis treatment. Since defaulting is behaviour research areas were focussed towards the 3 main categories distinguished in the theory of reasoned action: behavioural beliefs, normative beliefs and control beliefs or “barriers”. Five countries were visited to carry out observations. In these five contexts both quantitative information and qualitative information from interviews, reports and observations were included. In order to widen the range of data collected as much as possible, all relevant documents available in 2007 within MSF-OCA were included. In the discussion section these findings are commented on and direction for changes in the setup of programmes is given. The thesis ends with a set of advice to MSF-OCA specifically aiming at reducing default rates to an acceptable level.
Authors:
van der Velden, E.
Country:
Sudan
,
Myanmar
,
Côte d'Ivoire
,
Ethiopia
Category:
Research
Department:
Development Policy & Practice
Institute:
KIT (Royal Tropical Institute)
Keywords:
health
,
health services
,
nutrition
,
conflict
,
humanitarian assistance
Language:
eng
Organization:
KIT - Royal Tropical Institute
PAGE:
iv, 87
Year:
2008
Region:
North Africa
,
Southeast Asia
,
West Africa
,
East Africa
Right:
© 2008 van der Velden
Subject:
Health and Nutrition
Title:
Improving default rates in Ambulatory Therapeutic Feeding Programmes in operations by Médecins sans Frontières Operational Centre Amsterdam
Training:
Master in International Health (MIH)