The Communication Initiative
Development action with informed and engaged societies
The Communication Initiative
After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future.
 
Co-founder Victoria Martin is pleased to see this work continue under Wits' leadership. Victoria knows that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction.
 
We honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades. Meanwhile, La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA) continues independently at cila.comminitcila.com and is linked with The CI Global site.
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Assessing innovations for increasing the uptake of vaccination among communities: Vaccine Indicator and Reminder (VIR) Band Community Engagement Intervention

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The Vaccine Indicator and Reminder (VIR) band is a low cost innovative device which reminds parents when it is time to vaccinate their newborn children. The VIR band is made of silicon with a built in “timestrip” indicator and secured to the ankle of infant. It serves as a visual clue to every member of the household and community regarding the importance of childhood routine immunization (RI) timeliness and completion. The VIR band also serves as a record of the vaccines administered to an infant, serving the parents as well as the healthcare providers.

 

The VIR band is being evaluated for increasing  i) RI timely initiation and ii) RI timely completion through distribution of the VIR band to infants visiting Expanded Program on Immunization (EPI)  vaccination centers. Every infant enrolled in the VIR band study is provided three separate bands, one at each first three visits. Each band corresponds to the time interval for the next vaccination dose/visit.

Prior to the introduction of the VIR band in a community a robust community engagement and communication intervention has been conducted to facilitate its acceptance and compliance in the community. 

The VIR band has received seed grant from the Grand Challenges Exploration (November 2012) Innovations in Health Award and was recognized as one of the four most innovative ideas submitted during the round. The VIR band proof of concept study was completed in June 2015.  The current VIR band formative evaluation study, November 2015—April 2018, is funded by the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie). The main objective of this study is to assess the structures and process that need to be in place for rolling the intervention at scale. 

What Works? Shifting Norms; Changing Behaviours; Amplifying Voice - #SBCCSummit

Comments

Submitted by shilpidas on Wed, 01/31/2018 - 20:56 Permalink

Dear Noor,

The VIR Band concept seems to be very innovative and interesting and the evaluation study results would be well interesting. Look forward to the process understanding in the upcoming #SBCC Summit.