Empowering community health volunteers (cadre) as an effort to improve health in postpartum mothers

Abstract

Abstract. Maternal and child health are important issues to pay attention to. Empowerment of community health cadres is one of the strategies as an effort to prepare them physically and psychologically to care for mothers and babies after returning from the hospital or maternity hospital. The problems identified here were the lack of knowledge and lack of activity of community health cadres. One effective way to increase productivity to improve maternal and child health was through this community service program through the empowerment of community health cadres as an effort to improve health in postpartum mothers and their babies. The purpose of this community service was to empower groups of community health cadres to improve their knowledge and skills so that the maternal and child health became better. The method of implementing this activity was the community development model, which was an approach that involved the community directly through partnerships with community health cadres through counseling and training. The results of this service program showed that the lowest pretest score obtained the was 50, and the highest was 70. Post-test scores obtained a lowest score of 80 and a highest score of 100. The average score of the pretest was 65.38, and the post-test was 90. Based on these results, it can be concluded that there was an increase in knowledge by 45.88%. The increase in knowledge, skills, and community involvement, especially of health cadres, can increase the community empowerment through education to improve health especially for postpartum mothers and their babies.