The purpose of this study was to evaluate IRC’s “Fifth Child” strategy on community engagement in defaulter-tracing and outreach planning, implementation, and monitored strategy as a potential solution to address stagnating immunization coverage in remote areas.
The evaluation team specifically measured the extent to which the data-informed community co-managed defaulter-tracing approach works to increase diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis coverage, reduce drop-outs, and improve timeliness of immunization uptake. Heterogeneity analyses of subgroups included impact amongst 1,760 children ages 12-13 months in households across socio-economic quintiles, by distance from a health facility, and by ethnic group.
Findings concluded that the mobile data-informed community engagement strategy did not show a significant impact on coverage of the primary outcome between intervention and control clusters. However, there was a significant increase in valid coverage from baseline to endline.
The Airbel Impact Lab at IRC is a team of researchers, strategists and innovators committed to the accelerated design, rigorous evaluation and cost-effective scaling of the most impactful solutions supporting people affected by crisis.