PRONTO is excited and honored to have its work in Guatemala featured on the Global Health Frontiers Series.
In 2012 PRONTO was awarded a Saving Lives at Birth grant to implement a quality of care improvement initiative in a region of Guatemala known as the “Corridor of Death.” This region has the worst statistics for maternal and neonatal health in the country. For every 1000 babies born, 120 will not live past 28 days. In partnership with our in-country collaborator, CIESAR, and UCSF, our project’s aim is to save mothers and their babies during childbirth by increasing the number of women who give birth in health clinics rather than at home and to improve the quality of care a laboring women receives by skilled birth attendants at these facilities.
Through a multifaceted community outreach campaign that includes collaboration with traditional birth attendants, pregnant women are encouraged to seek healthcare early in their pregnancy and to give birth in clinics. Traditional birth attendants are widely used in the indigenous community in Guatemala and hold a great cultural significance. By integrating the traditional birth attendants and cultural practices into the clinic setting, indigenous women are able to preserve cultural practices surrounding childbirth while also having access to skilled medical staff who are trained to identify and manage complications. With the inclusion of PRONTO’s highly-realistic, in-situ emergency obstetric and neonatal training to doctors, nurses and midwives in the clinics, a laboring woman has the best opportunity for a good outcome during birth. PRONTO’s training program increases care providers’ skills, knowledge and confidence for identifying and implementing best practices for managing and resolving emergencies during childbirth while providing kind and dignified care to the women and their family.
You can learn more about our work in Guatemala through the Global Health Frontiers Series. Check your local public television listings for the time and channel. The segment will air in the Seattle area on KCTS at 11 PM, Wednesday, April 27th. Alternatively, the segment is available for viewing online.
The acclaimed public television documentary series Global Health Frontiers expands to a weekly newsmagazine with four one-hour episodes combining compelling journalism from the leading edges of global health developments with a fast-paced and energetic style. Although filmed primarily in Asia, Africa and Latin America, global is local as the series explores the impact of hot-button health issues central to daily conversation in the United States — GMO foods, “Big Tobacco,” childhood immunization campaigns, and more, including insect-borne health challenges coming to a backyard near you.
Within Global Health Frontiers’ newsmagazine format, the programs feature three separate stories, each a short documentary that follows engaging characters through journeys, trials and tests that define the relentless work of global health today. Viewers will witness the unvarnished truth, the successes and failures, and the inspiring tenacity of people who answer the call to meet this century’s defining challenge.
“Global Health Frontiers brings television viewers inside the critical work in global health like no other program today,” explains Emmy Award-winning veteran news correspondent Gary Strieker, executive producer of the series and former CNN Nairobi bureau chief and global environment correspondent. “Pioneers of prevention and change are making advances against infection and pandemics to make them preventable and treatable, and we report their stories with captivating first-person storytelling.”
Working with an advisory panel including eminent experts at the Harvard Global Health Institute, the UCSF Global Health Group, and The Carter Center, Global Health Frontiers’ producers develop stories that represent a broad range of critical global health issues worldwide and assign veteran news gathering crews to craft first-class reporting for the discerning audience of public television.
Global Health Frontiers is produced by Cielo Global Health Media and is distributed nationally by American Public Television. Funding was made possible by support from the John Moores Family.
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