Literature Review

Information on the effectiveness of FP/RH programs in the West and Central Africa region is sparse. While DHS and other population-based surveys provide important information on characteristics of women and men of reproductive age, they do not provide information on how programs work. Operations Research studies are important sources of information on program functioning, however they are often conducted in small areas and are not always generalizable to other populations. In addition, many studies don’t appear in the published literature.

In order to gather all the information on FP/RH programs in the West and Central Africa region, Tulane conducted an exhaustive literature review that included several steps:

1. POPLINE search for all published literature and reports
2. Country-level inventories of FP/RH studies in the four SFPS countries was conducted to find unpublished literature.
3. USAID cooperating agencies involved in the WCA region were contacted to identify any studies that were not identified in steps one and two.

The information from the literature review was then organized according to questions. Project staff developed a list of questions that they wanted answered and then included the answers to those questions using the data available. In some cases there was no information to answer the question. The following are some examples of the questions:

Unmet Need for Family Planning

• What is the level of unmet need?
• What are the characteristics of those with unmet need?

Training

• Are certain models of training more effective than others?
• What attempts have been made to test competency at a given point after the training?

IEC

• What media and channels are used for promoting FP?
• What are the key sources of FP information among target population?
• What evidence exists on the effects of IEC interventions?
• What IEC programs exist that are targeted to youth?

All the information was entered into an interactive system using Powerpoint that can be easily accessible to anyone with a computer.

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