Job Opportunity in Cameroon: Apply for the position of a Social and Behavioral Change Consultant with ReachOut
5 min read
Deadline: 14 August 2022
- Profile Requirements
Essential
• Hold a master’s degree or higher in social science, public health, or a related field.
• Justify a professional experience of at least five (05) years in conducting similar activities including
developing and evaluating community engagement SBC approaches
• Excellent writing skills
• Strong skills and experience in monitoring and evaluation and familiarity with operational research
• Demonstrable experience in supporting community dialogue approaches in community health.
Background and context
Cameroon is one of the 10 African countries with the highest burden of malaria; and malaria continues to be a major cause of morbidity and mortality, with vulnerable populations, particularly conflict affected communities, at risk. In 2018, there were 6.2 million cases and 11,192 deaths from malaria (WHO, 2019). Although, since 2011, the number of cases registered within health facilities was steadily reducing, progress appears to have stalled in recent years. In the Southwest region, according to the most recent available data collected prior to the humanitarian crisis, malaria prevalence stands at 46.1%, and 60% of all interactions with the health system were due to malaria. In 2017, the Northwest and Southwest regions of Cameroon descended into a violent armed confrontation between state military and non-state armed groups. This has created recurrent cycles of displacement, and civilians have sought refuge in the forests and farmlands, rural, urban and peri-urban areas in the Littoral region and in neighbouring Nigeria (Human Rights Watch, 2020) (OCHA, 2019). This has resulted in a displaced population moving to an area of higher malaria endemicity and resulting increase in malaria incidence and prevalence. Over 712,264 people (OCHA, July 2021) are displaced by this conflict, and more than 37% of health facilities in the SW are non-functional, limited attention has been paid to the impact of the crisis on the fight against malaria in these areas, and on gathering evidence on the most effective ways of restoring primary healthcare under the current conditions. The operational research programme Breaking Barriers is focused on 80 conflict affected communities in the SW and Littoral Regions – both host and displaced communities.
The overall objective of Breaking Barriers is to develop, implement and evaluate scalable, replicable, and
innovative approaches to improve access to effective malaria case management through community-ased
services in conflict affected and host communities in the South-West and Littoral regions of Cameroon by 2023.
Specifically, the project seeks to:
- Identify at least two innovative solutions, appropriate to the context and with the potential to
overcome local barriers and increase coverage and quality of community-based management of
malaria in conflict-affected communities.
2) Evaluate the feasibility of the interventions and their acceptability among target populations, CHWs,
health facility workers, and health district and regional health authorities.
3) Evaluate the impact of the interventions on coverage of appropriate treatment of malaria by CHWs,
including severe malaria.
The Operational research which started in November 2020 is in two phases: The formative phase and the
intervention phase. Findings from the formative research of the Breaking Barriers project identified three key interventions to improve the quality of malaria prevention and control services and support host and displaced populations in Southwest and Littoral regions:
Community Health Participatory Approach (CoHPA)
Supportive supervision
Health vouchers for children under five years for severe malaria and adults for simple malaria.
The 3 interventions seek to address the weaknesses within the system and barriers to effective malaria care services. This requires specialists support to work alongside the research officer and knowledge manager supported by global technical advisors from MC for social behaviour change and community health. The specialist support is estimated to be 5 days per month for the local consultant for 12 and a half months.
The supportive supervision component of the programme requires an ICCM specialist to work with the
supportive supervision system, providing direct support, gap filling supervision activities that cannot be
completed by the current team, namely, training, supportive supervision, and resource analysis.
The specialists will work with the District Civil society organization (DCSO) and Chief of centers (CoCs)
community Health workers, community health volunteers and project team to support their work and gapfilling for supportive supervision and SBC activities. The specialists will report to the senior research officer.
The Community Dialogue Approach (CDA) was identified as a preferred intervention to bridge addressing
barriers to malaria care and improving access to quality malaria case management. The Community Score Card (CSC) method was also chosen for participatory monitoring and evaluation of community engagement (CE) activities for malaria prevention and treatment in the community. COHPA is a CDA approach to increase the sense of social accountability towards malaria treatment and prevention and ultimately build community ownership of issues affecting the community health in general and malaria in particular. This programme will be implemented through trained Community Health Volunteers in
the 80 communities supervised by 5 field supervisors working closely with associated community health teams.
- Purpose of the assignment
The purpose of the SBC Consultant is to support the Project Team in the implementation of the monthly
community dialogues in 80 communities under the direct supervision of the Operational Research Specialist
(ORS), and in collaboration with the project team within the implementation phase of the Breaking Barriers
project. - Scope /Payments
The consultant will work in the project office in GRA Buea for 5 days every month except during field activities under the direct supervision of the ORS. Payments will be made installmentally every 6 months upon approval of all deliverables by the supervisor including timesheets for actual dates of work and consultant performance evaluation. - Details of the Technical Support
General Objective
The purpose of the SBC consultant is to provide technical support to the Operational Research Specialist (ORS)
in conducting and monitoring COHPA interventions within the implementation phase of the Breaking Barriers
project.
Specific Objectives
Under the direct supervision of the ORS, and in collaboration with the project team, the SBC consultant will
be responsible for the following specific functions;
• Provide technical SBC leadership in the implementation of COHPA activities.
• Work with communities to ensure that community dialogues are inclusive, equitable and
participatory.
Strengthen local SBC capacity: Guide the field supervisors, MC and REO team in the implementation
of a high quality CDA intervention ensuring adherence to COHPA tools and guidance. This includes
supervision of field supervisors, ongoing training.
• Support the field team to ensure that we close the CoHPA feedback loop
• Ensure strong monitoring of all activities working closely with knowledge manager ORS and REO
team.
• Identify challenges to implementation based on changing context and make recommendations to
adapt tools and activities to REO and MC.
• To support relevant surveys to ensure robust research.
• Any other activities and responsibilities as directed by the ORS.
Duration of work
The contract for this assignment is from the 1st of September 2022 – 15th of September 2023
Click HERE to read more details and apply
Berinyuy Cajetan is the founder and publisher of Human Rights and Legal Research Centre (HRLRC) since 2017. He has intensive experience in strategic communications for Civil Society Organizations, campaign and advocacy, and social issues. He has an intensive experiencing in human rights monitoring, documentation and reporting.
