The National Quality Assurance Standards (NQAS) certification is an important government initiative to improve and maintain quality standards at public sector health facilities in India. Bhavnagar district in Gujarat has managed to achieve high levels of primary health care facility certification within a relatively short time. On the other hand, other IPSI districts- Kalahandi in Odisha and West Garo Hills in Meghalaya are at the initial stages of NQAS certification and are facing challenges.
To understand and learn the strategy adopted by Bhavnagar district in NQAS certification progress, a cross-learning visit was organized on 24-26 June. Visiting teams from Kalahandi and West Garo Hills districts comprised of district quality program manager and staff from HWCs applying for NQAS certification. An opening session on the first day by Bhavnagar district officials provided an overview of the district and NQAS progress to the participants. Over the course of three days, the teams visited four PHC-HWCs and one SHC-HWC that have been NQAS certified and interacted with the staff. On the last day, a de-brief meeting was organized wherein the participants filled feedback forms and an open discussion was encouraged to share experiences and learnings from the visit. Visiting teams reflected on the strengths of Bhavnagar district, namely- strong support from district authorities providing motivation and facilitation of NQAS processes at HWCs, supportive state policies, and relatively better equipped health system in terms of staff, medicine and equipment supply and facility infrastructure compared to their districts. Kalahandi and WGH teams shared some of the practices that can be adopted despite the health system challenges such as – standardizing IEC materials, translation of NQAS tools in local language, flexibility of fund uses at HWC level, and improving team coordination at HWCs. Kalahandi and WGH teams felt inspired and motivated to improve NQAS certification in their own settings following this visit.
