Introducing eHealth strategies to enhance maternal and perinatal health care in rural Tanzania.

Background: Globally, eHealth has attracted considerable attention as a means of supporting maternal and perinatal health care. This article describes best practices, gains and challenges of implementing eHealth for maternal and perinatal health care in extremely remote and rural Tanzania.

Methods: Teleconsultation for obstetric emergency care, audio teleconferences and online eLearning systems were installed in ten upgraded rural health centres, four rural district hospitals and one regional hospital in Tanzania.

Enhancing Maternal and Perinatal Health in Under-Served Remote Areas in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Tanzanian Model.

Background: In Tanzania, maternal mortality ratio (MMR), unmet need for emergency obstetric care and health inequities across the country are in a critical state, particularly in rural areas. This study was established to determine the feasibility and impact of decentralizing comprehensive emergency obstetric and neonatal care (CEmONC) services in underserved rural areas using associate clinicians.

Methods: Ten health centres (HCs) were upgraded by constructing and equipping maternity blocks, operating rooms, laboratories, staff houses and installing solar panels, standby generators and water supply systems.

Emergency obstetric surgery by non-physician clinicians in Tanzania.

Objective: To calculate the met need for comprehensive emergency obstetric care (CEmOC) in 2 Tanzanian regions (Mwanza and Kigoma) and to document the contribution of non-physician clinicians (assistant medical officers [AMOs]) and medical officers (MOs) with regard to meeting the need for CEmOC.

Methods: All hospitals in the 2 regions were visited to determine the proportion of major obstetric interventions performed by AMOs and MOs. All deliveries (n = 38 758) in these hospitals in 2003 were reviewed.

The quality of emergency obstetrical surgery by assistant medical officers in Tanzanian district hospitals.

Five countries in sub-Saharan Africa use nonphysicians to perform major emergency obstetrical surgery. In Tanzania, assistant medical officers provide most of this surgery outside of major cities. Questions about the quality of surgery by nonphysicians have kept most African countries from following this example.