Help poor women get access to gynecology services by Apnalaya

Help poor women get access to gynaecology services

Thank you!

This program is fully funded because of donors like you.

Impact

Every monthly donation helps more women like Ruby access gynecology care

Ruby Shaikh lives in Chikhalwadi, Govandi. She has 3 children. With her husband being unemployed she was the sole breadwinner of the family. Ruby ran a takeaway lunch catering service for a living. She developed heavy vaginal discharge, abdominal pain and was frequently ill.

Societal taboo made her uncomfortable to seek help and she suffered in silence. She was also worried that if she was hospitalized she would lose her sustenance. During a regular home visit, an Apnalaya health worker met Ruby who confided about her problems. She was advised to come to the clinic. The doctor started her treatment.

Ruby regularly visited the Apnalaya Gynaecology clinic and completed her treatment course. She is now healthy and has resumed work completely.

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By donating to this program

you will be sponsoring the overall costs incurred to support the beneficiaries


About The Program

What the beneficiary gets
Maternal Care
What you get
Tax Exemption
Periodic Reports
Program Description

Apnalaya runs an initiative to address the issue of maternal, newborn and child healthcare and nutrition in 8 slums in Shivaji Nagar, Govandi in the M/E ward of Mumbai Municipal Corporation. Government schemes and primary health care including maternal and reproductive health care services have been inadequate and ineffective.

There are no maternity homes or inpatient health care centers for a population of 6 lakh in Shivaji Nagar. 78% of the population in this area is living in slums and has the lowest life expectancy rate. Apnalaya works towards improving the maternal health care through its antenatal and gynecology clinics. These clinics provide healthcare to women who otherwise have no access to healthcare.

When you support this program, you help in the running cost of the expenses of the clinic and help women get access to basic healthcare.

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About The NGO

Apnalaya
Apnalaya Logo
Apnalaya

Apnalaya is a secular voluntary organization, that has been building self-sustaining communities since 1973. It aims to empower the disadvantaged to overcome the social, political and economic barriers and help them lead a better quality of life. They work with the most marginalized people dwelling in the slums of Mumbai. There are 4,200 children under 6 years of age at the center of Apnalaya’s Health Program.

The Health and Disability related interventions emphasize on empowering community members to improve health seeking behavior and access healthcare instituted by government agencies. The Livelihood program equips young boys and girls, men and women to identify the potential of opportunities and turn them into economic productivity. They provide sewing classes, enroll and train women who otherwise have been under cultural restraints to stay away from income-generating activities.

209 women have economically benefited from Self Help groups organized by Apnalaya. The Education and citizenship program aims to bring together the volunteers from the community so that they have a better understanding of the challenges faced by their community and identify their responsibilities towards it. In 2017, Apnalaya was awarded the Champion Level- GuideStar India Platinum for highest levels of transparency and public accountability.

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founders
Founded in 1991
NGO Leadership

Arun Kumar

areas of operation
Area of Operation
Area of Operation

Maternal health | women

location of work
Location of Work
Location of Work

Maharashtra

Apnalaya has

helped 322 underprivileged people earn a livelihood in FY 17-18

awards
Awards And Recognitions
Awards And Recognitions

2017: Girl Power Awards

2018: Yeh Hai India award

last audited
Last Audited
Periodic Compliance Checks by GiveIndia

Renewals FY 19-20

Program Updates

Program Updates

22 September, 2023

An update on the program you are supporting

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Activities and work undertaken in the last 5-6 months

224 pregnant women in Mumbai were impacted through this program


Challenges faced and next steps

The proposed project aims to bridge the gap between service delivery and service consumption. The main emphasis is on educating people and families about maternal health and nutrition, early pregnancy detection, technology-assisted screening to identify high-risk pregnancies, raising awareness and referral for early registration and regular antenatal care checkups, as well as ensuring uptake of antenatal care and postnatal care services offered by government healthcare providers. The emphasis is also on enhancing community health workers' abilities to support and counsel expectant mothers and their families. The project was implemented in 15 Health Posts (Government health facilities for maternal and child health) in the M East Ward of the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai. 30 Arogya Sakhi's identified new 224 pregnant women conducted ANC visits to the registered pregnant women, out of 224, 60 (27%) pregnant women were found at high risk.


Stories from the ground

Arogya Sakhi met Sabina during community visits. Sabina was pregnant for the third time, and she confirmed her pregnancy by using the kit. Arogya Sakhi talked to her about antenatal care checkups and referred her to the health post and guided her about the importance of early registration. Arogya Sakhi went for a 2nd follow-up visit to Sabina�s home and found that she had not gone to health post or any other health facility for a check-up. Sabina said that there is no one to take care of her children at home and also shared she is having issues with white discharge. Arogya Sakhi advised her to go to the doctor but she was not willing to go to the government hospital because it take too much time and the children are small. So Arogya Sakhi advised her to go to Gynecologist. She went there and told Arogya Sakhi about it that they gave her some medicines and also asked her to do sonography. Similarly, she also underwent sonography and antenatal check-up, after a few days she reported that her white discharge had reduced.


20 December, 2022

Support to pregnant who are at high-risk due to Gynaecological issues

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Activities and work undertaken in the last 5-6 months

COVID-19 pandemic has brought to light the extremely neglected healthcare system in the country. With all healthcare resources focused on managing the pandemic itself, disruption of essential services for maternal health poses a risk to both mothers and children. This could lead to an increase in maternal and infant morbidity and mortality. In a report by Apnalaya it was found that, out of 534 deliveries, 32 were at home just in a period of two month during the lockdown (The Wire, by Sukanya Shantha). The issues at hand need to be addressed through a systematic and comprehensive approach.

Apnalaya, in collaboration with the technology partner, established this innovative urban health care model for maternal and child health in urban slums of Mumbai. In partnership with municipal corporation, we have been working in Urban Health Posts (HPs) of M East Ward and have established a workable model of improving the uptake of maternal and child health services and outcomes of pregnancy and delivery.

Early detection of high-risk pregnancy needs to be done at the earliest and receive timely care and support for a healthy birth outcome. Timely and quality antenatal care helps identify high-risk pregnancies and with the regular intervention of health workers, we should be able to achieve the desired outcomes. We have 30 Aarogya Sakhis working in the 210 slum clusters to identify the pregnant women and register them under the project intervention.

During the reporting period 4898 pregnant women registered in the project. The project team closely worked with these women and their families to track the pregnancies, providing counseling and support on health and nutrition, and referrals treatment and diagnostic.


Challenges faced and next steps

One of the challenges encountered during the intervention is the gap in awareness regarding various social protection schemes and services. This becomes a major barrier for the families in accessing the benefits under the schemes. This results in poor uptake of various healthcare benefits under the public health system. To overcome this challenge, various awareness sessions were conducted to provide information on the services and schemes and how to avail of them. The focus will also be to facilitate the convergence of various stakeholders as this was deeply impacted due to the pandemic and associated restrictions.


Stories from the ground

Shilpa (22) lives with her husband in a rented house in Sivneri Nagar. On her 5th month of pregnancy, Shilpa got herself registered in Apnalaya’s programme. She had not visited a hospital so far. With the help of the Arogya Sakhi and through regular monitoring, Shilpa registered her name in the nearest hospital to ensure she has a safe delivery. Since then, she regularly visited the hospital for her routine check-ups, including required diagnostics like blood tests and sonography.

Her husband had odd jobs that did not bring in regular income. Hence, they struggled with financial constraints. Shipa’s husband thought it would be best to take Shilpa to their native place in the village. The family was convinced to stay back by their neighbours till the delivery as the village lacked quality healthcare services.

On an unexpected day, Shilpa’s water broke and she went into labour. She was taken to Shatabdi hospital which is a government hospital near the community but they refused to admit her because her case seemed critical and they did not have the required infrastructure to take up a high-risk case. She was further referred to the tertiary government hospital. Shilpa underwent and emergency C-section and delivered her son.

He was born with a birth weight of 2.5kgs, which was healthy as per WHO criteria. After the delivery, the doctors suspected COVID-19 infection. The baby was found negative for the infection, but Shilpa was unfortunately found positive. She was under quarantine and treatment for the next 20 days. Throughout this period the Arogya Sakhi kept in touch with the family for support. With timely support and care, both Shilpa and her baby were able to come out of this very difficult phase healthy.


3 June, 2022

Help poor women get access to gynecology services

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Activities and work undertaken in the last 5-6 months

Apnalaya is working in the M eastward on maternal and newborn health, coordinating 15 BMC health posts and catering to around 8 lac population. Apnalaya has been linking the community members with connecting them to these services and bridging the gap in accessing gynecological services. This is being done through a frontline health worker called Arogya Sakhi. During the reporting period, 4878 pregnant women were identified, linked to medical services, and provided counseling and health and nutrition services.


Challenges faced and next steps

During the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a lot of misinformation and fear among the families residing in the slum population. Due to the fear of being contracted with COVID-19, families avoid visiting the clinic for check-ups. This meant they were missing out on necessary medical care and intervention. In such a situation, high-risk cases were not being identified. To address this, the project team would regularly communicate with the families, both in-person and virtually, answering their queries around COVID-19. This helped ease their fear and ensure they avail themselves of medical services.


Stories from the ground

Vijayalaxmi Mayone (aged 30 years) moved from Chennai to Sathe Nagar, Mankhurd, with her husband and 9-year-old child over a year ago. They did not have any relatives or friends in Mumbai. Apnalaya’s Arogya Sakhi met her during the community visits and registered her into the intervention project. At the time of registration, her Haemoglobin level was 10.2g/dL, and she had a medical history of 4 miscarriages after her first pregnancy. She was experiencing breathlessness and had edema in her legs. As a result of these indicators, this was identified as a high-risk pregnancy. Communication was a challenge here as Vijayalaxmi did not speak or understand Hindi. The Arogya Sakhi then found out that Vijayalaxmi’s neighbors said a similar language, so Aasma decided to communicate through them. She followed up with Vijayalaxmi often through health and nutrition counseling. She was advised to lie down with her legs slightly raised to decrease the swelling and what foods she should eat to improve her health and well-being and ensure the baby is also healthy. In her 8th month of pregnancy, Vijayalaxmi went to her village to prepare for her delivery. However, by this time, Vijayalaxmi understood a little more of Hindi, so the Arogya Sakhi continued to check-up on Vijayalaxmi and counseled her over the phone. Vijayalaxmi’s Hb level had increased to more than 11g/dL, had a safe delivery, and gave birth to a healthy baby girl weighing 3.3 kgs.


29 September, 2021

Virtual ANC clinics for pregnant women during the Covid 19 pandemic and referral support

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Activities and work undertaken in the last 5-6 months

A Virtual OPD was started by Apnalaya during the pandemic to support pregnant women living in Shivaji Nagar. In the first wave of Covid 19 most of the facilities were closed but we saw the improvement in the health facilities in the 2nd wave, there were some open health care facilities in the M/E ward. During this reporting period, Deonar maternity home started OPD service for pregnant women, this was under construction for the last 6 years. We ran the virtual clinic to provide guidance and support to pregnant women who not went to Antenatal care check-ups in the health facility. In the first quarter of this reporting period conducted the virtual clinics for pregnant women, Dr. Sharmishtha provided consultation through video calls. Mostly cases doctors refer to the hospital for the further care that is needed during pregnancy.20 virtual ANC clinics have been conducted and 290 pregnant women received guidance and counselling from Dr Sharmishtha. We also provide iron-folic acid, calcium, and protein powder to them. The high-risk women were referred to the hospital. Community people are scared to went to the hospital for registration and regular Antenatal care check-ups. We coordinate with the 3 health posts and refer pregnant women to Health posts for registration and primary services. The health post team was doing the focused work on mother and child health care. They conducted community camps and gave Tetanus vaccination in the community centres to pregnant women. After April 2021 onwards we are given focused on the referral and linkages of the pregnant women with the govt health and nutrition facility. We have Mother support group members who do the Identification of pregnant women and link them with the Anganwadi for Nutrition services and health post for health services. In the health post, they get folic acid, IFA, and Calcium tablets.


Challenges faced and next steps

We conducted virtual clinics but it was a limit on beneficiaries. We changed the methodology of implementation of the activity because of the covid 19 pandemics. Covid 19 vaccination started everywhere, in our intervention area the people were having a misunderstanding about vaccination like 'Vaccination ke baad Insan mar jata hai, Coronahi Nahi hai to vaccine Qu leneka' Ye population Kam karneke liye rachaya Hua kand hai"! In one cluster Apnalaya conducted the baseline survey to see the coverage of vaccination before start the project and in this data we found only 4% of community members got vaccinated! Apnalaya started the community awareness to motivate community people for the Covid 19 vaccination and also coordinate with BMC to availability of vaccination. Conducted training with community leaders and volunteers to make a clear understanding of vaccination. After that, we observed that the people started to encourage each other for vaccination. Plan for the next 6 months is 1. Increase and strengthen the women's health care services. 2. Community health care awareness and conduct covid vaccination camps in the community.


Stories from the ground

Virtual OPD an initiative by Apnalaya was started during the pandemic to support pregnant women living in Shivaji Nagar. The nationwide lockdown travel restrictions, unavailability of medicines, and lack of access to good healthcare facilities left thousands of pregnant women deeply anxious across the Shivaji Nagar community.Virtual OPDs are conducted on Tuesdays and Fridays every week. The target group for this activity is pregnant women who have less than 12gm of HB levels. With proper planning, area-wise lists of beneficiaries are prepared and time slots are distributed between them to avoid overcrowding. A doctor who conducts the OPD connects virtually with the beneficiaries and goes through their Anti-natal check-ups. The doctor provides health consultation, IFA tablets, protein powder as well as guidance on nutrition intake and the importance of regular check-ups. Anwari Bano Wasim Shaikh, one of the pregnant women to attend the virtual OPD, shared her acknowledgement for Apnalaya, she said “My husband works as a labourer but due to lockdown he lost his job. We have 5 members in the family but no money; we survived on the bare minimum. In such a situation it became very difficult for me to buy the IFA tablets and go for my regular check-ups”. She added, “Apnalaya’s support has meant a lot to me and my family”. Another beneficiary Abeda Hakikullah Shaikh shared the number of times she’s visited the virtual OPD. She said “the doctor and the staff treat us very nicely, they have supported us by giving us the IFA tablets and protein powder” she further said, “virtual OPD has supported us not only through medication and guidance but it has also helped us save money, time and most importantly provided us safety from the virus”.


23 March, 2021

Virtual clinic for pregnant women and lactating mothers in the community

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After the lockdown, we started the virtual clinic twice a week for pregnant women and gave preference to anaemic women as our intervention area has more than 61% percent women who are Anaemic. An area-wise lists of beneficiaries was prepared and time slots were distributed between them to avoid overcrowding.


Till date, 19 virtual ANC clinics have been conducted and 164 pregnant women received guidance and counselling by Dr. Sharmishtha. We also provide iron folic acid, calcium and protein powder to then. The women who were high-risk were referred to the hospital.


Hero Story
Anwari Bano Wasim Shaikh, one of the pregnant women to attend the virtual OPD said “My husband lost his job due to the lockdown my family of 5 were surviving on the bare minimum. In such a situation it became very difficult for me to buy the IFA tablets and go for my regular check-ups. Apnalaya’s support has meant a lot to me and my family.” Another beneficiary Abeda Hakikullah Shaikh said, “Virtual OPD has supported us not only through medication and guidance but it has also helped us save money, time and most importantly provided us safety from the virus.”


Through such innovative activities, the organisation has always tried to lend support to the community. The members of the community trust the project team and depend on them for any kind of support.



5 July, 2020

Apnalaya’s Antenatal and Gynaecology clinic in progress

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Apnalaya’s Antenatal and Gynaecology clinic in progress




Apnalaya’s Antenatal and Gynaecology clinic has continued running twice a week. In the last quarter 26 clinics conducted and 306 ANC (Pregnant women) and gynaec cases received treatment. In this period, 46 women continued using copper-T and came for regular follow-ups, and 28 new females availed family planning services. 43 cases received treatment for menstrual health issues and 47 on other gynaecological issues. 21 cases referred for further treatment to government facility.



3 December, 2019

Women attending informative sessions

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Women attending informative sessions







22 July, 2019

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Program Update


Consultant gynaecologists, Dr. Datye and Dr. Sharmishtha provide good quality treatment to the poor patients in the clinic. During clinic doctors not only provide the treatment, also provide the guidance on their healthy life style including nutrition and hygiene. Apnalaya provides medicine for one week to the patients and follows up through community health workers. Those cases refers to treatment from the clinic doctors’ advise them to come again for follow up with reports. This has led to a built up of a rapport within the community and the support which will ensure a strengthened community based management of issues.


Between Jan and March 2019, 24 ANC and Gynaec clinics consultations were conducted. 76 ANC (Pregnant women) and 298 women for Gynecological issues visited the clinic. Out of 298 cases 32% cases had menstrual health issues and white discharge. These patients were provided treatment along with counseling. Total 119 cases were referred to Government hospitals for further treatment. Total 4 sessions were conducted during the quarter covering 79 individuals. The topics of the session were - Family planning methods, Gynecological issues including white discharge, and nutrition.


Story from the field


Kanchan has been staying in Padma Nagar from the past 3 years. Her husband is an auto-rickshaw driver, and they have 3 children (2 daughters & 1 son). Kanchan is a housewife. She has been visiting the Apnalaya Clinic for the past 3 years, and is receiving regular medication from there. She came to the clinic because she experienced morning sickness and dizziness at the time of her second pregnancy. She eventually started feeling a lot better with the medicines. She then registered herself at Rajawadi Hospital, and said that the doctor there was very helpful. The doctor assisted her with family planning, which was quite helpful for her. She started feeling better on taking the medicines at the clinic, and while she was receiving medicines from there, she also continued following up at Rajawadi Hospital regularly. Her delivery went by smoothly as well.
She was also of the view that Apnalaya doctor speaks is very humble way, and explains things patiently. She mentioned that before visiting the clinic, she had a lot of gynaec-related issues like white discharge, but the moment she started meeting the doctors at the clinic, the issues came under control. Kanchan now takes all the people whoever needs help at the clinic, and gives them information about what are the things that are done at the clinic, and how are they effective.


What is the expected total number of beneficiaries in this program for FY18-19?360
What is the number of beneficiaries/ benefits provided in this program, Year-To-Date374
Village/City/State where project is locatedShivaji Nagar, Govandi, Mumbai
Total Budget for the project for FY18-19296725
Total Expenses for the project YTD196978

30 October, 2018

Apnalaya's Update

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Program Update


The Ante Natal Care and Gynaecology clinic is open twice every week, on Tuesdays and Fridays in Padma Nagar, a slum settlement on the edge of Deonar dumping ground in Shivaji Nagar, Govandi, in north east Mumbai. About 7-8 family members stay in matchbox-like shanties of 10X15 feet, surrounded by 9.2 million tons of garbage dunes. Almost every public utility service is denied - Housing, Rations, and Water - to name a few. Not only is a quality life denied, but consequently, life itself is denied - with the average age of death being 39.30 years. The predominant livelihood is rag-picking and recycling of waste. Apnalaya partners with local communities and works on issues like education, health, disability, livelihood and citizenship.
The severity of the conditions in Shivaji Nagar stands at a tall note and thus the need of a clinic or a nutrition counselling becomes a priority for the people living in the 12 clusters of Shivaji Nagar. In the wake of such a condition, Apnalaya provides medicines and advice from a consultant gynaecologist who comes in every 2 days of the week to all the women attending the clinic from the adjoining areas too. This has led to a built up of a rapport within the community and the support which will ensure a strengthened community based management of issues.


Story from the field


Clinic Case Story
Name: - Soleha Ansari
Age: - 28 yrs.
Community: - Padma Nagar


Soleha Ansari has lived with her family in Padmanagar from last 5 years. Her family includes 5 people, 3 children and Soleha and her husband lives in a rented house. Since her huband is the only one member who works in Garment factory as labour, taking care of house hold expenses is very difficult and there is always shortage of money and often changes a house.


Solheha has been taking medicines from the hospital for 8 years. When Soleha was pregnant with her third child, she followed the advice given by the doctor and was regular in the clinic.


She had registered her name in the government hospital but due to lack of money, she was taking medicines from Apnalay Clinic.


According to Soleha when she was taking her one child to private clinic, she used to spend more money on consulatation and also they used prescribe medicines from outside, but since she started taking medicines from Apnalaya Clinic she is able to take care of her three children health related expense in half of the money she used to spent earlier on her one child. She also likes the advice and treatment given at Apnalaya Clinic doctor. As a result when she given birth to her third child, she decided to go for birth control.


Solihaha thinks that the apnalaya clinic is very useful for poor and poor people in the area.


Expected total number of beneficiaries in this program for FY18-191000
Number of beneficiaries/ benefits provided in this program this year553

18 May, 2018

Apnalaya's update

#1


Our Clinic successfully serves the 12 clusters of Shivaji Nagar with the help of two doctors associated with us from the last 6 years. Some of the patients are referred by the health workers who work in the community, while some of them are walk-ins from the same community. The clinic encourages many women and girls to visit the premises with ease and confidence.
Patient data:
From 1st January 2018 to 31 March 2018, 351 patients, attended the Antenatal and Gynecological Clinic. Also, during this quarter, 38 women attended Antenatal care clinic and 313 women visited the gynecology clinic. This quarter, 38 women attended the ANC Clinic out of 1st Trimester - 12, 2nd Trimester - 16, 3rd Trimester - 10, 44 women came for menstrual problems, 57 women came for white discharge problem, 8 women came due to Infertility, 3 women came for Information, 27 women came for IUD - Insertion, 15 women came for IUD - removal, 56 Women come for IUD - checkups, 96 women came for other Gynecological illness, 38 women came for Antenatal visits, 7 women came for post-natal visits. Remarkably, 14 of them were referred to the nearby government hospitals for registration for antenatal care with the government (5 women referred by gynecological problems which require diagnostics, 3 women referred by ANC Registration , 1 referred by MTP, 1 woman referred by less than 6 HB, 2 women referred by Eyes Checkup, 2 women referred by FP, 1 women referred by TB.
Most of the diseases diagnosed and treated result from the vicinity of the dumping ground and living conditions of the patients.


Soleha's story
Soleha Ansari had been living with her family in Padmanagar for the past 5 years with her husband and three children. Since her husband is the only one member who works (in Garment factory as labour), taking care of household expenses is very difficult and there is always shortage of money.
Soleha has been taking medicines from the hospital for 8 years.
When Soleha was pregnant with her third child, she followed the advice given by the doctor and was regular in the clinic.
She had registered her name in the government hospital but due to lack of money, she was taking medicines from Apnalaya Clinic.
According to Soleha when she was taking her child to private clinic, she used to spend more money on consultation. They also used to prescribe medicines from outside, but since she started taking medicines from Apnalaya Clinic she is able to take care of her three children's health related expenses in half of the money she used to spend earlier on a single child.
She also likes the advice and treatment given at Apnalaya Clinic by the doctor. As a result when she gave birth to her third child, she decided to go for birth control.
Soleha thinks that the Apnalaya clinic is very useful for the poor people in the area.



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