ORGANIZATIONAL BACKGROUND INFORMATION OF ECOH
1. Name of Organisation: Ekhlaspur Center of Health (ECOH)
2. Contact person/ responsible officer:
Dr. Jasimuddin Ahmed, Director, ECOH, Ekhlaspur, Matlab North, Chandpur 3641,
Bangladesh.
E-mail: [email protected], [email protected], phone: 01819256596; website: www.ecoh.tk
3. Founded: May 1999
4. Founder: Dr M Mostafa Zaman, MBBS, MPH, PhD, Recipient of Bangladesh Academy of Sciences Gold Medal Award for his contribution the area of Cardiovascular Disease, research in particular.
5. Language/s used: Bengali and English
6. Geographical area of activity: Matlab North Upazila, Chandpur District, Bangladesh. It is 60 km from Dhaka city but lacks a direct road link from Dhaka. River is the only mode of communication. The area is in effect an island surrounded by 2 rivers, Meghna and Dhonakoda.
7. Mission statement: Promotion of health and prevention of morbidity and premature mortality.
Activities include: Antenatal and perinatal services, Integrated management of childhood illnesses (IMCI), birth and death registry, awareness building (especially tobacco and drug abuse), health care on an outpatient basis, health camps (rheumatic fever camp, heart camp, hypertension camp, diabetes camp, etc.), and research.
8. Target population: All the people of the activity area (Matlab North) with special attention to underprivileged, women and infants
9. Research activities: Conduction of epidemiological research on cardiovascular diseases and their determinants. Publications in scientific journals include (as of Dec 2006):
• Zaman MM, Choudhury SR, Ahmed J, Numan SM, Islam MS, Yoshiike N. Non-biochemical risk factors for cardiovascular disease in general clinic-based rural population of Bangladesh. J Epidemiol 2004;14:63-68.
• Zaman MM, Choudhury SR, Ahmed J, Yoshiike N, Numan SM, Islam MS, Parvin K, Hakim F. Plasma lipids in a rural population of Bangladesh. Eur J Cardiovasc Prev Rehabil 2006;13:444-448.
• Zaman MM, Ahmed J, Choudhury SR, Numan SM, Islam MS, Parvin K. Prevalence of metabolic syndrome in rural Bangladeshi women. Diabetes Care 2006;29:1456-1457.
10. Dissemination of activities: ECOH newsletter, reports, newspaper articles and websites, meetings, and workshops.
11. Yearly budget (approximately): US$15,000 for 2005.
12. Bank details: Name of account: Ekhlaspur Center of Health (ECOH)
Current account number: 509
Janata Bank
Mohonpur Branch
Mohonpur, Matlab North, Chandpur 3641
13. Major sources of funding: Members fee, donations, nominal outpatient fees, laboratory charges and others, funds for public health activities and research received on contractual basis
14. Number of staffs: Four fulltime and four part-time staffs, and 10 volunteers, and 100 members. Five expert consultants provide hospital services, and plan and implement community-based programmes.
15. Brief summary on how the NGO has contributed to local, national and/or regional policy shifts: One of the biggest strengths of ECOH is that it is run and managed by the local people/community and thus it works mainly by generating resources at the local /community level. Thus a sense of belonging and ownership exists in the community and it facilitates the mobilization and participation of the community in realizing its activities and goals. ECOH is working in the spirit of partnership and participatory manner. Since ECOH is run and managed by the local people, it has clout among the local members and chairman of the union council and encourages and tries to convince them to be proactive in health promotion.
Its contribution includes
1. Prevention of major non-communicable diseases, e.g., hypertension, heart disease, stroke, cancer, diabetes and COPD;
2. Tobacco control;
3. Death and birth registration;
4. Improvement of maternal and child health;
5. Advocacy for safe water and sanitation;
6. Collaboration with government and non-government organizations on important locally prevalence diseases.
16. Any other relevant information
a. This is the first NGO in the Matlab North Upazila is working in the area of tobacco control. Given the strength of ECOH stated above, undertaking the proposed project would go a long way for tobacco control in this remote outlying area which has minimum access to mass media.
b. Membership: ECOH is a member organization of the “Bangladesh Network for NCD Surveillance and Prevention (BanNet)”.
c. Partnership: ICDDRB, National Heart Foundation, BRAC.
17. Main researchers:
a. Dr M Mostafa Zaman, MBBS, MPH, PhD, Post-Doc
b. Dr. Sohel Reza Choudhury, MBBS, PhD
c. Dr Jasimuddin Ahmed, MBBS, MCPS, PhD
d. Dr Sharkar Md Numan, MBBS, MPH
