Introduction:

Reporting mortality information is the primary data source from which evidence can berndrawn to monitor disease trends and inform public health policy to improve populationrnhealth. Still only two-thirds of expected annual deaths are reported globally. Healthrneducation and promotion play a significant role in empowering communities to uptakernpublic health services such as mortality surveillance.

Objectives:

The main objective was to fill gaps in health education on mortality surveillance.

Methodology:

This qualitative descriptive studyrnaimed to understand health workers HWs perspectives regarding the need for healthrneducation to support mortality surveillance in Machakos County Kenya. The capabilitiesrnopportunities and motivation for the behavior change model guided the study. Semistructured interviews were used to collect data from 10 participants based on theirrninvolvement in death registration activities training as HWs and participation in healthrneducation activities

Findings:

Findings from coding and thematic analysis indicated formalrneducation and training about death registration were rarely or never provided torncommunity members or HWs who learned about mortality surveillance on the job.rnOpportunities for educating community members about the importance of deathrnregistration healthcare tasks were reported. HWs who attended community meetings werernallowed time to talk to people regarding the significance of registering their dead. Deathrnprevention was the strongest motivation for reporting deaths.

Results:

Conclusion:

The findings indicated thernneed for a curriculum and educational material for healthcare workers and communitiesrnon the importance of mortality surveillance. Findings may enable the Machakos Countyrngovernment health department to enrich HWs training by integrating health education onrnmortality surveillance.

Author(s):

Focus County(s):

Machakos County

Programme Area(s):

Public Health & Health Research Systems

Research Priority Area(s):

Disease Domain(s):

Health Systems

Publication Date: 01.Jan.2023

Conference Title:

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