GRAAM formed Jan Arogya Samiti (JAS) a committee that proposed to set up Health and Wellness Centres (HWC ) and SHC (Sub Health Centres) under Ayushman Bharath in the selected HWCs of West Singhbhum & Khunti district of Jharkhand. These Jan Arogya Samitis were formed to empower the people on their health care needs, improvement in infrastructure facilities, and effective utilization of public health care services.
As part of the USAID-supported NISHTHA project in partnership with Jhpiego, GRAAM is in piloting the project Community monitoring and social audit mechanism of Health and Wellness Centres (HWC) through the formation and strengthening of Jan Arogya Samithi (JAS) in selected HWCs of West Singhbhum and Khunti District of Jharkhand State. As part of the project, it is expected to engage the communities for health and allied areas and establish community Monitoring & accountability mechanisms in the intervention areas as per the GOI guidelines.
JAS is one of the key community-based organizations introduced by GOI in December 2020. This committee which is being formed at the Sub Health Centre (SHC) level Ayushman Bharat- Health and Wellness Centres (AB-HWC) shall be named Ayushman Bharat – Jan Arogya Samiti (JAS). As par to the objectives of the JAS which serves as an institutional platform of SHC/PHC level AB-HWCs for community participation in its management, governance, and ensuring accountability, with respect to the provision of healthcare services and amenities. JAS will work as the platform for planning and supporting multi-sectoral action on Social and Environmental Determinants of Health, especially to address a) Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs), and b) Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH), and (c) Malnutrition, Stunting, and Anemia. It will coordinate the celebration of annual health calendar days at HWC-SHC and facilitate and support VHSNCs to undertake the celebration of Annual Health Calendar Days.
JAS is expected to develop an Annual Action plan which serves as a monitoring mechanism for the upcoming year. Health planning is a complex activity that requires a certain level of knowledge and skills. Hence, detailed training on the process of health visioning to develop a health plan was initially conducted for the project team to get familiarised with the process to handhold the communities in performing the activities and in developing the health plan.
GRAAM team has conducted the following activities during the last three months. The Project implementation team has been trained on the following aspects to conduct the Community Health Plan.
- Development of Health planning tools and finalization.
- Community Mobilization for Health Planning.
- Recruitment of JAS and Community for the Health Visioning exercise.
- Conducting the Community lead Health visioning and planning exercise.
- Documenting and finalizing the health plan drawn from the community.
A decentralized health planning has been a must achieve the task to bring out positive changes in community health. The exercise was conducted with the participatory method a PRA exercise with the following activities was conducted as part of the health planning exercise.
- Transit walks around the village.
- Social and HWC Resource Mapping
- Seasonality analysis
- Developing a Chapatti Diagram
- Focused group discussion for Health Visioning to develop a Community Health Plan.
