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IDEAS Phase 2: Measurement for Better Maternal and Newborn Health

IDEAS uses measurement, learning and evaluation to find out what works, why and how in maternal and newborn health programmes.

The IDEAS phase 2 project was launched in 2016 to build from learning generated in the first phase of research. Working across regions of Ethiopia, in Gombe State and Lagos State in Nigeria, and West Bengal in India, the quality of care provided to mothers and newborns was a central theme.

During the first phase it had become clear that programmes for maternal and newborn health did not have the data they needed to track progress in the delivery of high quality health care; that programme managers needed to be more agile in their use of data for decision-making to achieve the best quality of care from the health system; that innovations launched with donor funding were difficult to sustain; and that there was insufficient evidence about the mechanisms through which quality improvement interventions operated in different settings.

And so, six independent areas of research were developed by our multi-disciplinary team, with close attention paid to learning from one another and to learning with country partners.