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WHY IS THERE A NEED FOR GR-RB INTEGRATED REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH SERVICES?

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The reality shows that health providers, with all their technical knowledge and skills, are not necessarily equipped with a gender perspective or with an integrated approach to reproductive health
services.

RH being intensely personal and requiring a high degree of privacy as well as associated with strongly held beliefs and the subject of social, religious, ethical, political and legal structures, need services
that recognize these factors.

RH is also significantly affected by behaviors of sexual partners that bear directly on an individuals choices, health status and treatment outcomes.

Although training resources are available to help providers in the delivery of reproductive health services, most of these resources are technical in nature and often do not include the social context.

There is a need for health providers to address the different areas of reproductive health care in a more integrative manner, taking into consideration what the elements have in common and the linkages
among them.

Service providers need to view and approach the clients reproductive health need in a holistic manner, thus requiring the health provider to be technically adept as well as gender-sensitive, client-
oriented, interactive and empowering.

Clients normally seek RH service for one presenting symptom/complaint such as one aspect of maternal and child health services (pre-natal and post-natal care, immunization, nutrition) or family
planning, delayed menstruation, painful urination or post-abortion care.

Health providers tend to focus on the presented need or problems expressed during a client visit. Although they may be aware that such particular need presented by the client may have come from other
needs or concerns that contribute to their primary problem, they may fail to identify underlying and other important related needs and problems.

This results to missed opportunities of addressing sexual and reproductive health (SRH) related and other important issues that clients fail or may be constrained to express due to fear, shame or lack of
knowledge.

Thus, opportunities for health education and addressing potentially life threatening consequences of unmet SRH problems such as sexually transmitted infections (STIs), violence and high-risk
pregnancies are neglected.