Protecting the Right of Women to Affordable and Quality Health care in Armenia: Evaluation of the Maternity Care Certificate Program (Counterpart International – Armenia office, Civic Advocacy Support Program)

The goal of this project was to contribute to the MOH efforts to reduce/eliminate the practice of out-of-pocket, particularly informal, payments for maternity services that are guaranteed by public funding through government payments to hospitals assuring equal quality and access to health care and social benefits.  This study highlighted the strong and weak components of the program and identified mechanisms for improvement through a qualitative assessment in Yerevan and three marzes of Armenia.  In April 2010 CHSR organized a public policy round table to share the findings with the MOH, Parliament Health Committee, NGOs, students, graduates, and faculty. CHSR Director presented the findings of this study during a TV Program devoted the Obstetric Care State Certificate Program implementation in Armenia. Later, CHSR translated the report into Armenian and disseminated among the local and international stakeholders.