Leveraging private sector actors to improve maternal infant and young child nutrition care in India

In this PoshanWeekly issue, we highlight Alive & Thrive’s partnerships with leading medical professionals and medical colleges in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar to develop an integrated package of MIYCN protocols that were based on global and national standards. These protocols included services such as counselling on diet and micronutrient supplements, gestational weight tracking during antenatal care, initiating breastfeeding within an hour of birth, and counselling on exclusive breastfeeding and complementary feeding.  

These experiences are captured in three case studies which this issue of Poshan Weekly will bring to your desktop.  

1) ‘How India's private hospitals are catalysing change for maternal, infant and young child nutrition: Quality improvement case studies from private hospitals in Bihar’ aims to show that empowering frontline health workers to apply the latest scientific evidence can collectively improve MIYCN service delivery and have a lasting impact on the health and wellbeing of women and children 

2) ‘How India's medical colleges are catalysing change for maternal, infant, and young child nutrition: Case studies' is a result of Alive and Thrive’s strategic partnerships with nine government medical colleges in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. The partnerships were aimed at building the capacity of future generations of medical practitioners in evidence based MIYCN practices 

3) 'Leveraging professional medical associations to strengthen MIYCN policy and programmes in India' is based on how professional medical associations can be leveraged to engage the private health sector to ensure effective coverage of key MIYCN interventions