The project “ORAMMA: Operational Refugee And Migrant Maternal Approach” has a vision to develop an operational and strategic approach in order to promote safe motherhood, to improve access and delivery of maternal healthcare for refugee and migrant women and to improve maternal health equality within European Union. Moreover the project will increase awareness, commitment and action towards improving maternal health of refugees in EU.
There is an increasing need for a prompt, coordinated, and effective response for all migrant and refugee pregnant and lactating women with newborn babies. Migrant and refugee women face specific health risks and challenges during perinatal period that need to be dealt by well-trained multidisciplinary teams of health professional experts since they are characterized by a complex physical, psychological and mental state of health.
The majority of the refugee pregnant women, their families and their communities are not empowered to be healthy, do not always have adequate capacities to provide appropriate care during pregnancy or when the new baby has arrived, neither are they able to make healthy decisions and act upon those decisions, including the decision to seek care when needed. There is a lack of empower manifest in a number of levels while additionally gender constraints may prevent some refugee women from expressing the need for and obtaining care during perinatal period.
The ORAMMA project will develop, pilot implement and evaluate by comparative analysis an integrated and cost-effective approach on safe motherhood provision for migrant and refugee women, taking into consideration (a) best practices, (b) the special risks and characteristics of the target group and (c) the transferability of the model in different healthcare systems across EU: from camps sites in Greece, to National Health Services in the UK and to community-based model in Netherlands.

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