[Using anthropology to improve newborn health care in Cameroon].

INTRODUCTION

Policy directions in the health sector are based on research which provides insight into implemented actions and helps to formulate improvement recommendations for health. In Cameroon, an innovative experience of anthropological research on newborn health was followed by a process of appropriating findings by the Ministry of Public Health aiming at improving the quality of care. We suggest reporting this Cameroonian experience of interdisciplinary collaboration and involved research.

METHOD

Coinciding with the anthropological study on newborn care in hospital maternities and at home conducted by researchers in the field of anthropology from December 2016 to June 2017, a process of appropriating findings was carried out. This article accurately describes this process both at the peripheral level, during "reflexive returns" in investigated maternity hospitals, and at the central level within the framework of work conducted by the study's steering committee. It reports on the changes that have taken place as a result of the study both at the level of health structures and at the level of national policies and strategies with a view to improving the quality of newborns care.

RESULTS

The output of this process is twofold. At the peripheral level, activities of "reflexive returns" led to in situ changes of some harmful practices detrimental to the survival of the newborn, such as inappropriate use of the cradle in the birth room and lack of knowledge relative to the fight against hypothermia through the practice of skin-to-skin contact. At central level, changes concerned communication and strengthening policies and strategies of newborn care.

CONCLUSION

The contribution of anthropology in the production evidence-based data is of paramount importance for the implementation of strategies to improve the quality of neonatal care. It opens up new perspectives for the sustainable improvement of the quality of care for newborns.