Kigali hosted the fifth International Conference on Family Planning, with the theme "Investing for a Lifetime of Returns."
The global community came together to assess progress towards the Family Planning 2020 goals, and the program highlighted the various returns on investment that family planning yields, from education and empowerment to economic growth and environmental health.
One Family Health is taking strides to ensure that more women have access to quality family planning services and a range of contraceptive options. In continued partnership with the Ministry of Health, OFH is expanding our package of services to offer women not only short-acting methods, but also longer- acting, reversible contraceptives such as implants. Globally, there is high demand for long-acting methods, especially in areas like the communities that Rwanda serves, where access to health clinics is limited and stock availability can be inconsistent.
On November 9th, OFH completed family planning training for eighty nurse-franchisees across the OFH network. The training program included a full review of family planning, but focused on provision and removal of implants, the most popular long-acting method. Applying best practices to ensure mastery of the new skills, the training – led by Ministry of Health trainers – included one week of supervised clinical training following the theoretical component.
OFH, with its network of 110 Health Posts that operate in the most under-served locations, has provided care and treatment to more than 1.6 million Rwandans to date, including nearly 500,000 women of reproductive age. In 2019, OFH plans to open 50 additional Health Posts, which will include the expanded family planning service package from the beginning.