Program Effectively: Principles, Models and Tools

Historically, family planning (FP) programs have received fragmented support, with insufficient coordination among supply, demand, and advocacy interventions.  As a consequence, their impact has often fallen short of stated goals or has been short-lived.

Over its five-year lifetime, ACQUIRE applied lessons learned from accumulated field experience to create a program model emphasizing the importance of, and potential synergy among, supply, demand, and advocacy. This Program Model for FP/RH Service Delivery reflects a holistic understanding of the health care systems that provide RH/FP services. The ACQUIRE Program Model, which applies to RH/FP services in general, as well as specifically to clinical FP services, highlights the need to view supply, demand, and advocacy as part of a dynamic system in which each piece influences and reinforces the other, and in which all have to be coordinated and be functioning effectively.

This section of the digital archive presents a series of case studies on repositioning FP in five Sub-Saharan African countries; these case studies identified elements of successful programs and helped to inform the development of ACQUIRE’s program model. It also includes reports that illustrate how the model was applied in several countries. Three of ACQUIRE’s practical programming tools are also linked here:

• The Reality √ Family Planning Forecasting Tool, which was successfully introduced in several countries to help decision makers to generate data for evidence-based advocacy, planning, and resource mobilization
• The comprehensive Programming for Training Resource Package, which outlines an overall approach to incorporating training into all areas of a health care program and offers information, methods, and tools for designing, developing, planning, implementing, and evaluating training and for strengthening training systems
• The Ten Guiding Principles to bear in mind when designing service programs that provide long-acting and permanent FP methods