UNICEF and the Ministry of Health and Medical Industry of Turkmenistan are working together to improve the quality of maternal and child health services, which is one of the key priorities of the national health system. One of the areas of this work is the optimization of home visiting services by health workers. This service plays an important role in the early detection and treatment of complications and saving the lives of mothers and children.

A UNICEF press release issued on March 3rd notes that in 2022, UNICEF supported the development of new standards for home visiting services for young children and Turkmenistan's first digital application for home visitors. In practice, this means that home visiting services provided by health professionals will now include prevention and counseling tools that will directly improve maternal and child health and nutritional outcomes, as well as early detection of developmental disorders. Thanks to new standards and applications installed on tablets, mothers and children will receive the best services from the very first days of a child's life.

Between February 28 and March 3, 2023, all healthcare professionals at the three selected healthcare facilities were trained to use the new home visiting app. This group of pioneers will test the app in the coming months before it is rolled out across the country at the primary health care level.