Success Story

Making Quality Health Care for the Poor a Reality

USAID has helped establish 15 immunization clinics that are helping protect children from potentially deadly diseases

Photo by: Stephanie Molina/USAID

Poor Dominican families in the Eastern Region of the country have been subjected to a deteriorated health infrastructure for many years. Hospitals and clinics were unsanitary and poorly maintained, and the minimal equipment found within was woefully inadequate and dysfunctional. Hospital staff, nurses, doctors, and administrators lacked training and resources, resulting in poor customer service, long waits, and low quality care. Over the past five years, USAID has worked with the Ministry of Health and other partners on multiple fronts, including helping develop and launch a social security system that will provide healthcare to the country’s poorest populations, with special emphasis given to immunizations. Now over 180,000 poor Dominicans are registered for subsidized healthcare, 14 hospitals throughout the region are offering high quality, customer service-oriented care, and 15 immunization clinics that are certified by the Pan American Health Organization are helping protect children from disease.