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🇳🇵 Nepal /Health & Science

Three-quarters of newborn care facilities in Nepal lack critical medicines

From Kathmandu Post · () English

Summarized and contextualized by DistantNews.

At a glance

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  • A recent assessment by Nepal's Ministry of Health and Food Safety reveals that nearly 75% of facilities offering special newborn care lack essential medicines for serious complications.
  • Critical medications like phenobarbitone and dobutamine were found in only a quarter and 42% of facilities, respectively, while basic antibiotics were more widely available.
  • The report highlights significant gaps in dedicated newborn care doctors, advanced equipment, and infrastructure like kangaroo mother care chairs, contributing to concerns about newborn mortality rates.

A recent assessment by Nepal's Ministry of Health and Food Safety has uncovered a critical shortage of essential medicines in facilities providing special newborn care. Nearly 75 percent of these health centers lack the necessary drugs to treat serious complications in newborns, a finding that raises serious concerns about the quality of care for vulnerable infants.

The report, titled ‘Functionality Assessment of Special Newborn Care Units for Improving Quality of Services for Care of Small and Sick Newborns at Health Facility in Nepal,’ revealed that vital medications such as phenobarbitone, used for seizure control, were available in only a quarter of facilities. Dobutamine, a drug for intensive care units, was found in just 42 percent of centers. While first-line antibiotics like ampicillin and gentamicin were more common, their availability does not negate the critical lack of other essential treatments.

The study examined the quality of services being provided and identified service gaps.

— Dr Madan Kumar UpadhyayaDirector at the Family Welfare Division under the Department of Health Services, commenting on the findings of the assessment.

Beyond medication shortages, the study, supported by the UN Population Fund, identified significant deficiencies in staffing and equipment. Only 57.6 percent of facilities had a dedicated doctor for newborn care, and advanced equipment for treating breathing difficulties was present in just one-fifth of the centers. Furthermore, a third of facilities lacked kangaroo mother care chairs, a low-cost intervention crucial for premature and low-birth-weight babies.

Infrastructure gaps were also prominent, with only 15 out of 85 surveyed facilities having a designated triage room. The report also pointed to poor quality assurance mechanisms, with less than a quarter of facilities conducting quality improvement activities related to maternal and perinatal death reviews. Communication with families was also found to be lacking, as only about a quarter of facilities routinely updated mothers or caregivers on their newborn's condition and treatment progress. Dr. Madan Kumar Upadhyaya, director at the Family Welfare Division, emphasized the need for extensive improvements to reduce the ongoing death rate of newborns.

A lot of things need to be improved to reduce the ongoing death rate of newborns.

— Dr Madan Kumar UpadhyayaDirector at the Family Welfare Division under the Department of Health Services, highlighting the urgency for improvements.
DistantNews Editorial

Originally published by Kathmandu Post. Summarized and contextualized by our editorial team with added local perspective. Read our editorial standards.

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