WAKA Maternity - Youth engagement and empowerment

The main problem is limited access to sexual and reproductive health information and services which contributes to unintended pregnancies, sexually transmitted infections. The unintended pregnancies have very diverse outcomes example unsafe abortions, prolonged and obstructed labour, and the youth are also faced with a lot of stigma from the community and friends. Unintended pregnancy results to unaccomplished individual goals that is in education and consequently unemployment including career path. According to Eunice Kamaara on "Reproductive and Sexual Reproductive Health Problems of Adolescent Girls in  - A challenge to the church" the Kenya and demographic Health survey, it indicates that 17% of the youth have had at least one child  before the age of 17, other studies in Kenya also indicate that by the age of 20, about 21% of all adolescents have had at least one child.

WAKA Clinic partners with WAKA Continuing medical education Center in visiting secondary schools and midlevel technical colleges to educate the youth on Reproductive health information, participate and have open days where we have free clinics on health checks and education on career development, self defense, self confidence, life skills, how to build self esteem and information on healthy and unhealth relationships.

WAKA team also visit churches and community focusing on integrated youth and women discussions on reproductive health, health risks of early marriage and child-bearing and intimate partner violence. At the WAKA School of Nursing we have identified a counsellor and students/peers who support  reduce stigma of students who come to school already pregnant and or have unintended pregnancies. The students are attended to at the WAKA clinic for their antenatal services and referred for delivery to the nearby county referral hospital.

Pregnant students are encouraged to continue with their studies until their last two to three weeks of pregnancy and encouraged to come back to school to continue with studies at least 6 months after delivery to allow time for exclusive breast feeding.

WAKA Clinic is used as a platform by the WAKA school of Nursing for dialogue with pregnant students, young mothers and their parents for education and acceptance of the situation and support of the student.

 We also visit schools to educate students on HPV among other. areas.

WAKA serves the communities from the Ruringu slum areas and environs, the students from WAKA School of Nursing and other institutions. The students  lack education from the  government to publicly provide SRHRS information and services in schools or institutions of higher learning, thus WAKA voluntary visitations to the schools are welcome in mainly providing information and refer those in need to the WAKA Clinic.

Youth are also shy to visit the facilities to request for information or services on SRHRS hence our outreach and in-reach voluntary services is a great avenue to reach the youth. 

Currently WAKA refers clients for delivery and caesarian sections to the public health facilities since we don't have the appropriate resources and facilities. 

Upgrading the clinic to a full fledged maternity and youth friendly center will therefore create space where the youth will easily access comprehensive reproductive health information and services, young mother will also be attended during prenatal period, intrapartum and postpartum including their babies. We will also encourage couple/partner RH services to ensure community involvement and support. 

Upgrading the clinic will also ensure WAKA Maternity and Medical Center offers not only outpatient services for both mothers and babies but also deliveries, and surgical services, MRI, Laboratory among other services (we are looking forward to a one stop shop service center) and only refer the very complicated cases  

WAKA Clinic has a highly qualified team of providers that are expertise in reproductive health services and have been involved in school health education, youth education in the church and the community. WAKA has also been partnering with the community for cleanup activities, visiting children's home with the youth from community and their leaders.

Other than the partnership with the adjacent WAKA School of Nursing students, WAKA Clinic also partners with community, subcounty and county leaders where we frequently conduct community diagnosis to establish community needs and suggest solutions, the reports are shared with the community for actions.

WAKA will develop SRHR solutions by actively involving the ten cell leaders, the chiefs, and county commissioners and leaders in at least four technical training institutions in the development and implementation, evaluation and documentation of SRHRS activities in the communities around the Nyeri Subcounty population. We will also engage and involve the Nyeri County Department of Health. 

the involvement of the team mentioned will start from the initial discussions with continuous formative evaluation and a final summative evaluation.

We serve approximately 100 clients per month 

WAKA  also visits at least 2 schools every quarter with a population of 500 students each

WAKA  conduct outreaches at least once a year and attend to approximately 300 clients which includes the youth and mothers

Partner with churches for outreach services once a year and provide health education and services to the youth and general public. the last outreach we attended to over 60 clients and about 20 youths.