Testing a community-based distribution approach to reproductive health service delivery in Senegal (a study of community agents in Kébémer)

The Division of Reproductive Health (DSR) of the Senegal Ministry of Health and Social Action, in partnership with the Population Council’s FRONTIERS in Reproductive Health program and Management Sciences for Health (MSH), conducted a study to test and compare three ways of providing reproductive health services to rural communities in the Kébémer district of Senegal in terms of their effectiveness, cost, and cost-effectiveness. FRONTIERS and MSH collaborated with the DSR to design the interventions, MSH supported the DSR in implementing the interventions, and FRONTIERS undertook the evaluation. This study, funded by USAID, responded to the recommendations of a 1999 workshop, organized by FRONTIERS and the DSR, on the community-based distribution (CBD) approach, which defined alternative CBD models appropriate for Senegal. The DSR sees the development of community-based service delivery models as essential for the future of health care in Senegal. As noted in this report, the general objective of the study was to contribute to the development of an integrated cost-effective program to increase the accessibility and availability of reproductive health information and services in rural areas of Senegal