Abstract
Nepal’s Female Community Health Volunteers (FCHVs) program started in 1988. In the early years of program initiation, FCHVs were assigned to promote and distribute the family planning commodities such as condoms and pills. Over past three decades, FCHVs’ roles have gradually expanded beyond family planning program and especially are focused on maternal and child health services at a large scale. FCHVs are an integral part of many community-based health programs, and their roles are instrumental in linking families and communities to community health workers and periphery-level health facilities. However, the fragmented nature of health programs poses a challenge for these health volunteers to coordinate activities and deliver the results. This perspective aims to review their contribution, challenges and recommend an integrated FCHV program model to support in the implementation of the community-based health interventions effectively.
Highlights
Female Community Health Volunteer (FCHV) program started in 1988
There is a declining sense of motivation among the FCHVs being coupled with minimal event based incentives offered to them for their volunteer’s support [20]
The Government of Nepal has acknowledged that the FCHVs have contributed significantly to achieve the milestones of the Nepal’s Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5 by providing basic health services to women and children in the community
Summary
In the early years of program initiation, married women of reproductive age were selected as FCHVs and assigned to promote and distribute the birth-spacing commodities such as condoms and pills, with the sole purpose of supporting family planning program in Nepal. These health volunteers have become an indispensable part of community-based health programs in Nepal [1, 2]. Mothers’ group for health (a group of women active in different local social and health activities within their locality) selects them to work within their community. After selection, they get 18 days of basic training on family planning, maternal, newborns, child health, and nutrition issues [4]. The FCHVs were assigned to act as health promoters and dispensers of health commodities, but later with few exceptions, they are serving as health service providers, notably treating childhood pneumonia and diarrhea at the community [5,6,7]
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