Bejoy Nambiar

TL;DR: In this article, a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials undertaken in Bangladesh, India, Malawi, and Nepal in which the effects of women's groups practising participatory learning and action were assessed to identify population-level predictors of effect on maternal mortality, neonatal mortality, and stillbirths.

TL;DR: Despite implementation problems, a combined community and facility approach using participatory women’s groups and quality improvement at health centres reduced newborn mortality in rural Malawi.

TL;DR: This case study confirmed that Malawi had achieved MDG 4 for child survival by 2013, and suggest that this was achieved mainly through the scale-up of interventions that are effective against the major causes of child deaths (malaria, pneumonia, and diarrhoea), programmes to reduce child undernutrition and mother-to-child transmission of HIV, and some improvements in the quality of care provided around birth.

TL;DR: The proportion of pregnant women participating in women’s groups was linearly associated with reductions in both maternal and neonatal mortality, but no evidence of associations was found between the effects of the intervention and background mortality or institutional delivery rates.

TL;DR: Improvements in hospital care may have reduced case fatality rates though a lack of sufficient data on quality of care indicators and the potential of socioeconomic and other improvements outside the hospital precludes adequate assessment of why case-fatality rates fell.