Wolfson Centre Lectures: Dr Erik Simmons

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The PLAY Collaborative: An Implementation Science Initiative to expand the reach and quality of play-based father-engaged home-visiting to promote early childhood development and prevent violence

High rates of stunting, under-stimulation and exposure to violence limit developmental outcomes in Rwandan children. The Government of Rwanda (GoR) recognizes affordable, scalable, and effective early childhood development (ECD) interventions are imperative for long-term child health and wellbeing.

To advance this goal, we have expanded delivery of Sugira Muryango (SM), a male-engaged active-coaching home-visiting program that builds responsive caregiving to promote ECD and prevent family violence.

The evidence-based SM has scaled to reach ~10,000 children from low-resource Rwandan households in 3 districts via a tested implementation strategy—the PLAY Collaborative—that leverages an existing workforce, stakeholder engagement, local and national government support, digital tools, and layered service coordination.

In this presentation, we will present the features of the multi-level, multi-component implementation strategy, the PLAY Collaborative, and findings from our embedded Hybrid Type 2 trial.