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Global Collaborating Center in Reproductive Health

 

Facts to Focus On

Maternal, perinatal, and infant mortality rates today are excessive in all segments of the world amongst the poor and underprivileged. 

Current medical knowledge exists today that can reduce this excessive and tragic mortality - it needs only to be shared and implemented worldwide. 

The science associated implementation must be the major focus for the next four years if we are to achieve the Millenium Development Goals. 

  

The Global Collaborating Center in Reproductive Health (GCC/RH) at Emory University was created in 1981 to address the high rates of poor reproductive outcomes in the State of Georgia. From the beginning the GCC/RH has been a working partnership of health professionals (Fellows) from three Atlanta institutions: the Woodruff Health Sciences Center of Emory University, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Georgia Department of Public Health.  These Fellows have experience in a wide range of disciplines important to the Implementation Science of reproductive health and perinatal care. These disciplines include maternal and perinatal medicine, nurse midwifery and nursing, primary health care for women including technologies important in child spacing, public health management, epidemiology, and the economic, cultural, societal, and ethical aspects of health.   

Problems in reproductive health and perinatal care are ranked by the World Bank as one of the top four contributors to the global burden of preventable death, illness and disability.  All societies depend on their next generation for survival, social security, and economic development.  However, most countries have failed to close the gap between what is known to be effective and what is actually implemented.  Therefore, the current focus of the GCC/RH is to improve the science associated with the implementation of evidence-based interventions for maternal and newborn services in low resource settings.  

Fellows of GCC/RH function as a team to improve reproductive outcomes by developing community-based maternal and perinatal health care delivery systems using transparent surveillance to guide continuous quality improvement of maternal and perinatal services. This ”Systems Solution” approach, made up  of eight (8) evidence-based strategies, has been associated with improved reproductive outcomes in the State of Georgia, the Center’s implementation science laboratory.   

Since 1982, the GCC/RH  has served as a global resource to the World Health Organization providing extensive support to more than 30 WHO member states in reproductive health and perinatal care.  Consultation has been provided to countries located in all regions of WHO including: Jamaica, Columbia, Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza, Ethiopia, Uganda, Tanzania, Greece, Romania, Poland, Russia, Georgia, Armenia, Moldova, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, China and Indonesia.  

Specific past international projects have included

A special working partnership has been built with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) through activities with the Center for Latin American Perinatology (CLAP) in Uruguay.

Vision

The vision of GCC/RH is to improve every family’s opportunities for a healthy and wanted pregnancy and a healthy outcome for every mother and child – and that following childbirth, the mother and infant are alive and healthy and the child  is safe and loved.

Mission

The mission of GCC/RH is to serve the people who serve the people. To accomplish this, a foundation of knowledge and skills is developed in the implementation science of reproductive health and maternal and perinatal care, enabling health professionals and decision makers to sustain these efforts on their own.

Projects

GCC/RH assists an individual state or country in:

Presently, GCC/RH has active domestic research projects in the states of Georgia and Mississippi to address the high infant mortality rates through the application of interconception care to reduce preterm/low birth weight births.  Active international implementation science projects  are in Russia, Cuba and Mexico.  

Goals

Three specific goals have guided the recent activities of GCC/RH:

First, it focuses on developing a center of excellence in Implementation Science to develop human capacity for implementation science research in state departments of health and universities in the U.S. and in ministries of health and universities around the world, especially in WHO member countries, to evaluate and solve their problems in reproductive health and perinatal care through country-specific projects.

Second, it continues to expand as a center of excellence in Implementation Science by adding a strong biomedical ethics section and expanding collaborative networks with professionals and governments around the world.  Experts and faculty are being recruited  to become participating Fellows.

Third,  support is being sought to establish two international educational fellowships, an endowed lectureship and a discovery fund.

In 2008, an endowed chair in Reproductive Health and Perinatal Care at Emory University was designated for the GCC/RH, donated by Drs. Ann and Frank Critz.

In 2010, a three-year grant was received from the Health Resources and Services Administration to initiate, jointly with the GCC/RH, a Maternal-Child and Reproductive Health Track within the Preventive Medicine Residency training program in Emory’s Department of Family and Preventive Medicine; the new track has  two positions  and provides a two-year public health focused experience in maternal-child and reproductive health, including an MPH from the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University.

Staff

Director
Alfred W. Brann, Jr., MD

Principal Investigator
Brian McCarthy, MD