Evidence map›Paper›PMID 36962465›Full record

ArticlePLOS global public health2022

Impact of the Liberian National Community Health Assistant Program on childhood illness care in Grand Bassa County, Liberia.

Emily White, Savior Mendin, Featha R Kolubah, Robert Karlay, Ben Grant, George P Jacobs, Marion Subah, Mark J Siedner, John D Kraemer, Lisa R Hirschhorn

Open access · goldFull text read
In one paragraph

Article in PLOS global public health, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
3citing papers in PubMed
1.5field-weighted citation impact, top 17% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

3 citing papers in PubMed, 5 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Article
  2. Article
  3. Measuring health system responsiveness in a national community health worker primary care programme in rural Liberia.International journal for quality in health care : journal of the International Society for Quality in Health Care · 2023
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

10 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.

Emily WhiteLast Mile Health, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America.
Savior MendinLast Mile Health, Monrovia, Liberia.
Featha R KolubahGrand Bassa County Health Team, Buchanan, Liberia.
Robert KarlayLast Mile Health, Monrovia, Liberia.
Ben GrantLast Mile Health, Monrovia, Liberia.
George P JacobsMinistry of Health, Monrovia, Liberia.
Marion SubahLast Mile Health, Monrovia, Liberia.
Mark J SiednerDepartment of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America.
John D KraemerDepartment of Health Systems Administration, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C., United States of America.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8769-3393
Lisa R HirschhornDepartment of Medical Social Sciences, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America.
Georgetown University · USHarvard University · USMen's Health Boston · USNorthwestern University · US

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Liberia launched its National Community Health Assistant Program in 2016, which seeks to ensure that all people living 5 kilometers or farther from a health facility have access to trained, supplied, supervised, and paid community health workers (CHWs). This study aims to evaluate the impact of the national program following implementation in Grand Bassa County in 2018 using data from population-based surveys that included information on 1291 illness episodes. We measured before-to-after changes in care for childhood illness by qualified providers in a portion of the county that implemented in a first phase compared to those which had not yet implemented. We also assessed changes in whether children received oral rehydration therapy for diarrhea and malaria rapid diagnostic tests if they had a fever by a qualified provider (facility based or CHW). For these analyses, we used a difference-in-differences approach and adjusted for potential confounding using inverse probability of treatment weighting. We also assessed changes in the source from which care was received and examined changes by key dimensions of equity (distance from health facilities, maternal education, and household wealth). We found that care of childhood illness by a qualified provider increased by 60.3 percentage points (95%CI 44.7-76.0) more in intervention than comparison areas. Difference-in-differences for oral rehydration therapy and malaria rapid diagnostic tests were 37.6 (95%CI 19.5-55.8) and 38.5 (95%CI 19.9-57.0) percentage points, respectively. In intervention areas, care by a CHW increased from 0 to 81.6% and care from unqualified providers dropped. Increases in care by a qualified provider did not vary significantly by household wealth, remoteness, or maternal education. This evaluation found evidence that the Liberian National Community Health Assistant Program has increased access to effective care in rural Grand Bassa County. Improvements were approximately equal across three measured dimensions of marginalization.

Identifiers

PMID36962465
PMCPMC10021826
OpenAlexW4283717086

What OpenQuestion holds

Textfull text, public
LicenceCC BY
measurements read45
identifiers read5
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.