The Center for Integration Science – together with the Universidade Eduardo Mondlane in Mozambique – serves as the Co-Secretariat of the NCDI Poverty Network, a group of 22 low- and lower-middle-income countries dedicated to reducing the death and suffering of those doubly afflicted by extreme poverty and severe noncommunicable diseases and injuries.
To accomplish this goal, the Co-Secretariat provides technical, policy, advocacy, and financing support for national NCDI Poverty Commissions in Network countries as they progress through a four-phase theory of change that starts with situation analysis and priority-setting for interventions to address conditions that disproportionately impact children, adolescents, and young adults living in extreme poverty and culminates with implementation of integrated service delivery models for prioritized interventions at national scale.
The Network Co-Secretariat delivers support through projects in six main areas:
- Equity-Driven Priority Setting – The CIS Policy team supports national NCDI Poverty Commissions with conducting equity-based situation analysis and priority-setting and producing reports to disseminate key findings and policy recommendations.
- Task-Mapping and Delivery Model Design – The CIS Research team supports countries that are engaged in Phase 2 activities with documenting the current availability and organization of prioritized services and developing models for progressive decentralization and integrated delivery of priority interventions
- Service Delivery Implementation Support – The CIS Programs team provides technical support for implementing partners and Ministries of Health in countries initiating (Phase 3) and scaling up (Phase 4) PEN-Plus programs, and coordinates support from the Training team for curriculum and training material development, the Research and M&E team for evaluation and impact assessment, and the Administrative team for program management, budgeting, and procurement.
- Curriculum and Training Material Development – The CIS Training team supports Phase 3 countries with establishing training and mentorship programs for mid-level providers to lead PEN-Plus clinics by developing both a working library of training materials and an e-learning platform for the core PEN-Plus conditions.
- Evaluation and Impact Assessment – Working with Ministries of Health, implementing partners, national NCDI Poverty Commissions, the CIS Research and M&E team is leading a program of implementation science research to evaluate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of PEN-Plus, assess the acceptability and appropriateness of services, and understand the unique challenges associated with initiating the PEN-Plus model in new countries and scaling it up nationally.
- Technical, Policy, and financial resource mobilization – The CIS Advocacy and Communications teams work to raise awareness of the need to prioritize access to care for severe conditions that disproportionately affect the world’s poorest children and young adults, to amplify the voices of people living with these severe conditions, and to mobilize a global campaign of solidarity to address these conditions as both a moral imperative and a key to achieving universal health coverage.