Abstract:
Background: Worldwide, possible serious bacterial infection causes about 600,000 neonatal
deaths per year. Community based management of newborn possible serious bacterial
infection when referral is not possible has been on implementation. Studies showed gaps on
its service utilization but studies addressing its barriers were not accessed.
Objective: To explore barriers and facilitators of community-based service utilization for
newborn possible serious bacterial infection management.
Methods: A descriptive qualitative study was conducted from March 11– April 7, 2019 in
Debre Libanos District, Ethiopia. Study participants were recruited purposively from six
kebeles; women‟s delivered within the last two months were the primary study participants.
Twelve in-depth interview and three focused group discussions were conducted; data was
audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim and translated, and analyzed using inductive thematic
analysis on atlas ti.7.1.
Findings: This study explored facilitators like availability of HEWs trained on communitybased newborn care [CBNC], health workers trained on Integrated Management of Newborn
and Childhood Illness [IMNCI], medical supplies and job aids,and performance review
meetings; and barriers like communities perception on newborn illnesses, belief of traditional
medicine, health care seeking decision making, socio-cultural and religious beliefs, lack of
awareness onservice availability, lack of program ownership and sustainability, unavailability
of CBNC trained health worker, weak health center and health post linkage, shortage of
HEWs, residency of HEWs, closure of health posts on working hours, poor HEWs
commitment and non-functionality of one to five and health developmental army [HDA]
were explored.
Conclusions: This study found that community based management of newborn PSBI was
discontinued due to barriers explored at different settings. This has big implication in that it
might not be possible to reduce newborn death with this community-based program in this
study setting. Therefore, attention should be given for the program to foster its
implementation, creating demand and developing health seeking behavior of the community
for newborn illnesses
