An Assessment Of The Quality Of Neonatal Care In Health Facilities In The Ho Municipality

ABSTRACT This study assessed the quality of neonatal care in health facilities in the Ho Municipality by focusing on availability of adequate and skilled human resources for neonatal care; equipment and care processes; and the perceptions of mothers of newborns on neonatal care in health facilities. Adopting the qualitative method, the study used a purposive sampling to collect data from midwives of 4 health centres as well as staff in the paediatric and maternity wards at the regional and municipal hospitals. Data collected through in- depth interviews, direct observation and analysis of documents from health providers, mothers of newborns and clinical records of sick neonates, were coded and categorised into themes for easy interpretation. The findings of the study were that staff were inadequate and this resulted in non use of the neonatal wards. Besides, most of them were inexperienced and hardly conversant with neonatal care issues until they went through some in-service training. It also found that equipment were either not available or non-functional, a situation which forced staff to improvise and thus put their lives and those of the babies in danger. In addition, lack of protocols resulted in medication errors such as overdose and under dose of fluids and medications. It also exposed lack of ambulance for referral as well as non adherence to aseptic procedures. Moreover, babies slept separately in a cot but were mixed with older children. Finally, the study revealed that mothers’ opinions on quality of care were mixed. They were more or less satisfied as they expressed trust in the health workers for providing satisfactory care but were unhappy that some nurses were unable to fix IV lines and for lack of sleeping place for them. The study concluded that there was the need for a change in policy direction and clinical interventions to ensure satisfactory, continuous and consistent care.