Maternal Health Education in Kambia - Introduction

For Alice and Peter's Weblog, see http://alicepeter.blogspot.com

About us

Hi! We are Peter Krause and Alice Kerr-Wilson: a Danish journalist and a British gender specialist. In November 2004, we headed out to Sierra Leone for 3 months to carry out a project in Kambia, in conjunction with the Kambia Hospital Appeal.

Maternal Health Film

Our main focus was a film about maternal health. Whilst there is a new hospital and 30 peripheral health units in Kambia, women continue to die or become ill in pregnancy and childbirth because they do not seek medical advice.

We met local medical staff, Traditional Birth Attendants (TBAs), women, their husbands and their families, and through discussions with them tried to understand the main social and cultural reasons why mothers-to-be do not seek medical advice when faced with particular reproductive health problems.

The main idea was to use local women and families as case stories in the film as well as interview relevant medical staff. Once our film was completed, local medical staff set up a travelling cinema (a TV, a video and small generator) and showed it in villages in Kambia district, with the aim of stimulating discussion about why women fail to seek professional medical advice and ultimately to encourage those who face difficulties in pregnancy and delivery to do so.

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For Alice and Peter's Weblog, see http://alicepeter.blogspot.com