Implementation of a community-based referral project to improve access to emergency obstetric and newborn care in Rohingya population during COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh

IntroductionThe delay in seeking emergency obstetric care leads to significant maternal morbidity and mortality and can worsen during pandemics, especially in humanitarian conflict settings with low uptake of obstetric services. To mitigate the challenges related to the second delay caused by lack of transport in the COVID-19 pandemic, the organisation United Nations Population Fund implements a community-based referral project called Referral Hub in the Rohingya refugee population in Bangladesh. The objective of the paper is to describe the implementation process of the Referral hub and present clients’ utilisation and perception of the service.MethodsFindings from part of a larger mixed-method study, the analysis of the standard operating protocol of the intervention, secondary data of routine utilisation of the 12 referral hubs between January and August 2020, 21 key informant interviews and a community survey among 100 pregnant women are presented in this paper.ResultsThe findings show an increasing trend in the referral hub utilisation and a strong recommendation of the service.ConclusionDue to a robust referral mechanism by collaborating with the community and engaging accessible and free of cost transport service, the intervention has high potential to improve access to facility care in low-resource and humanitarian contexts, especially during pandemics.