Facilitating equitable community-level access to maternal health services: exploring the experiences of Rwanda’s community health workers

Rwanda's maternal CHWs are heavily responsible for promoting equitable access to maternal health services. Consequently, they may be required to use their own resources for their practice, which could jeopardize their own socio-economic welfare and capacity to meet the demands of their families. Considering the unpaid and untrained nature of this position, we highlight the factors that threaten the sustainability of CHWs' role to facilitate equitable access to maternal care. These threats introduce turbulence into what is a relatively successful community-level health care initiative.