FOGSI, NABH & Swasti join hands to ensure equitable quality care for every mother

New Delhi: The Federation of Obstetricians and Gynaecological Societies of India (FOGSI) has signed an MoU with the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare Providers (NABH), Quality Council of India (QCI) to advance the government’s vision to improve the quality of maternity services.

In this direction, Swasti has been appointed as National QI Coordination Agency by FOGSI for Manyata, a national certification and quality improvement program for private maternity – led by FOGSI.

Playing the role of the National QI Coordination Agency for Manyata 4.0, Swasti would push the agenda of ensuring the scale-up of at least 1000 Social Healthcare Enterprises (SHEs) in the key states of India by 2024. This collaboration will ensure ‘One Nation One Standard’ where Maternity service providers (MSP’s) will be jointly assessed by NABH and FOGSI supported by Swasti. Together with FOGSI, Swasti and Manyata Partners want to ensure that quality of care reaches the last mile, where no mother risks dying due to childbirth.

The rising cases of preventable maternal deaths are a critical concern in India. For private health services that constitute the majority of maternity care services in India, there is a lack of national systems and regulatory standards to ensure quality. Considering that the shortcomings of the healthcare systems can be managed exceptionally well through regulatory measures, the Manyata program was launched by FOGSI in 2017. The program provides scalable quality improvement and sustainable quality assurance to healthcare providers, especially women-focussed facilities across India. As part of the partnership, Swasti will build a sustainability platform through services to the hospital, develop new three-layered Manyata standards, and also support a technology strategy for program implementation. Swasti will also work closely with FOGSI and the National Programme Management Unit (NPMU) to build a sustainable financing model for the program.

Commenting on the collaboration, Shiv Kumar, Founder of Swasti Health Catalyst, said, “Women do not only need antenatal care during their pregnancy, but also expert medical care during childbirth, and specialized neonatal support upon childbirth – all under structured supervision. We’re elated to take the partnership with FOGSI to its next milestone. As the National QI Coordination Agency, while ensuring the scaling of Manyata to 1000 new SHEs Tin India, Swasti is also looking at building a sustainable platform for quality improvement. Additionally, we will be working on the design and implementation of a technology strategy for SHEs that aligns with the Manyata ecosystem. Our intention is also to promote normative standards and innovations at a large scale, primarily for women’s healthcare facilities.”

Adding to the same, Dr Neha Parikh. Senior Technical Specialist at Swasti Health Catalyst, said, “Due to the lack of safety standards ensured by private healthcare providers, mothers face multiple complications. Provision of quality care is uneven, and often fails to reach the all the women who need it and often falling short of respectful maternal care. With the scale & sustainability of Manyata we want to ensure that quality maternal care reaches every pregnant woman and newborn throughout pregnancy, childbirth and the postnatal period. The vision is to strengthen the core values of quality, equity and dignity, that Manyata Partners uphold.

Dr. S. Shantha Kumari, President, FOGSI, and Treasurer, FIGO said, “Embedding standards for quality of care in health systems hold great potential in reducing maternal mortality and achieving the health-related SDG targets. However, in India, despite the increase in the number of women delivered in facilities, maternal mortality remains alarmingly high, suggesting gaps in quality of care. The current SRS data suggests that India’s maternal mortality ratio (MMR) has improved to 103 in 2017-19, from 167 in 2011-13, highlighting improvements in our health systems but we still have a lot of ground to cover. With around 50% of women in the country delivering in private maternity hospitals, there is an urgent need for the adoption of clinical standards by the obstetric community. We welcome the collaboration with NABH and Swasti that will only promise better outcomes and health for women in India.”

Dr. Hrishikesh D. Pai, President-Elect, FOGSI, and Chief Administrator, FOGSI-Manyata initiative, added, “We are delighted to come together with NABH and Swasti towards improving the quality of maternity care as well as access to this care with Manyata so that every woman in the country receives quality services wherever and whenever she seeks care. This collaboration is a significant milestone and will strengthen our commitment to providing equitable and high-quality maternal care in India.”

Dr. Atul Mohan Kochhar, CEO of National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare Providers (NABH) added, “Improving the quality of maternal healthcare in the country is certainly the need of the hour as India has one of the highest numbers of maternal deaths in the world. We strongly believe that it is imperative to lift the quality standards in maternal healthcare to be able to improve our health outcomes overall. This collaboration with FOGSI is a crucial step forward to strengthen the maternal health ecosystem across the country.”

Manyata’s footprint spans 22 states across a network of 1500 facilities in the country. It is a first-of-its-kind initiative which is building the capacities of healthcare workforce and providing certification, thereby setting a benchmark for maternal quality care. The sectoral collaboration between NABH, FOGSI and Swasti can create a paradigm shift in the maternal health ecosystem by complementing each other’s efforts to reach more mothers and create a more significant impact.