CHWs are trusted members of the community who are trained to support the general health of community members. CHWs are linked with community health facilities, district health offices, and in some countries national ministries of health and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Among the services CHWs offer are basic family planning methods and information about reproductive health in a private and confidential setting that may take the form of CHW visits to the client’s home, client visits to the CHW’s home, or CHWs seeing clients at a community health post or another location in the community.
Use of the term CHW varies considerably by country. CHWs may be known as community reproductive health workers (CRHWs), community health officers (CHOs), community-based distribution agents (CBD agents), village health workers (VHWs), or other terms. For consistency, only “CHW” will be used in this course.