Strengthening communities by accompanying leaders creates lasting change.
When we work together to share health and hope, we can make a greater impact. By investing in the empowerment of local leaders, supportive communities, collaboration across systems, and global health education, we work towards lasting change in the communities we serve and around the world.
Empowerment of Local Leaders
Local leaders have the power to create positive change within their communities.
We train and empower local leaders to identify needs, set goals, create plans for action, conduct research, collect data, and analyze progress towards their community’s health priorities. Our “Seeds of Esperanza” scholarship program supports our health promoters in attending nursing school or continuing their health education. Empowering local leaders promotes long-lasting change!
Supportive Communities
Mental and emotional health is an important part of “health for all.”
We invest in strengthening communities by supporting people across different stages of life. AMOS support groups offer spaces for social-emotional support and promote healthy behaviors for youth, pregnant women, young parents and their children, and patients with chronic diseases. Our “Parenting With Love” program educates soon-to-be moms and young parents in Nejapa about healthy pregnancies and healthy parenting practices. Our AMOS Cyberbox, which includes a community library and computer lab, helps children and youth learn in healthy ways and develop essential skills for their futures.
Collaboration Across Systems
We improve health outcomes by collaborating with others to create systemic change.
Our partners include Nicaragua’s National Ministry of Health (MINSA), local leaders, and other non-governmental organizations. While we have seen a reduction of child deaths in the villages we serve since 2012, neonatal mortality (death within the first 28 days of life) has declined at a slower rate in some regions of Nicaragua. To help save babies’ lives, AMOS partnered with MINSA to train government health professionals on using Essential Care for Every Baby (ECEB) and Helping Babies Breathe (HBB) protocols, such as skin-to-skin contact and early initiation of breastfeeding.
Global Health Education
We aim to transform the future of community health around the world.
We share what works across programs, with other organizations, and with other countries to serve more people than we could serve alone. We contribute to global research to encourage more health professionals to address community-identified needs using evidence-based interventions. Our Global Health Practicum and Internships give public health and medical students the opportunity to experience our model firsthand. Our hope is that future approaches to health care will include the process of working alongside communities in need.