Lamp in the Darkness: Radio Brings New Skills to Front Line Health Volunteers & New Behaviors to Marginalised Communities

This presentation includes information about "Sewa Nai Dharma Ho" (Service is Religion), a weekly radio distance education serial designed to strengthen the skills and knowledge of Nepal's frontline health volunteers (FCHVs) - 48,000 women who are largely illiterate, but who have brought dramatic improvement to the health status of Nepal’s predominantly rural population. This weekly education serial is complemented by "Gyan Nai Shakti Ho" (Knowledge is Power) - a weekly drama serial that garners the needed community support for FCHVs and promotes the adoption of health-seeking behaviors at the household level.

Summers suggests that many behaviors that underlie Nepal's high maternal and neonatal mortality rates and high unmet need for family planning are deeply rooted in tradition and cultural beliefs. Highly participatory and interactive, the radio serials have been welcomed in communities as a "lamp in the darkness," including by those communities that have been affected by the escalating conflict situation. According to Summers, radio is an increasingly powerful medium to remote villages as travel is restricted by civil unrest. In response to the multitude of different ethnic groups and languages in Nepal, the radio serials are adapted and translated into local languages - a step that has allowed health messages to reach what are considered the most vulnerable populations who have poor access to health services and are most in need of health-seeking behaviors. FCHVs facilitate radio listener groups established in the community, thereby empowering women to be agents for change in their own communities, creating an enabling environment for change, and linking vulnerable populations to the government health services.

"Gyan Nai Shakti Ho" and "Sewa Nai Dharma Ho" are part of the Radio Health Program, a behaviour change communication initiative of the Nepal Family Health Program funded by USAID.