In the Community Health area of focus, HDI works on child nutrition, WASH, and mental health. Using a holistic approach, HDI bridge our work on improving maternal health with improving child nutrition, given the strong interlinkages between the two areas. We also see overlapping areas with WASH and overall empowerment of communities, so we look into innovative ways to promoting access to improved WASH in order to improve child nutrition.

Our WASH programming requires a renewed approach as our research has shown that knowledge-dissemination interventions alone will not have the desired effect in improving WASH at a household level. Therefore, we look to develop partnerships that improve access to facilities in conjunction with awareness-raising work.

Mental health is a new intervention area for HDI. Here, we seek to advocate for the implementation of the integration of mental health as part of primary healthcare, as well as advocating for the prioritization of mental health within the Rwandan Ministry of Health.

We also see a gap in knowledge and understanding of mental health and symptom recognition, and we, therefore, promote community-based interventions to fill this gap.

In summary, our community health portfolios include:

  • Employing a holistic approach in disseminating information and services on child nutrition to improve mother and child health;
  • Addressing the intersection between WASH and nutrition through improved information-dissemination and behavior change communication interventions at the community level;
  • Advocating for increased equitable mental health services;
  • Providing our technical expertise in improving community health to service providers and policy-makers; and Sharing our research to foster learning and best practices.
WordPress › Error

There has been a critical error on this website.

Learn more about troubleshooting WordPress.