LEGAL AND POLICY DIMENSIONS OF PERSON-CENTERED PERINATAL HEALTHCARE IN UGANDA
Abstract
Statement of the Problem: Uganda has made notable legal, policy, and institutional efforts to improve maternal and newborn healthcare, including constitutional protection of the rights to life, dignity, equality, and women’s rights. However, many women continue to experience neglect, verbal abuse, denial of information, lack of informed consent, poor participation in decision-making, and other forms of disrespect during pregnancy, childbirth, and the postnatal period.
Purpose of the Study: The purpose of this article was to examine how Uganda’s legal and policy framework safeguards respectful, dignified, informed, and participatory perinatal healthcare. The article specifically focused on constitutional provisions, judicial decisions, international and regional human rights obligations, national health policies, and institutional arrangements governing maternal and newborn healthcare.
Research Methodology: The study adopted a qualitative doctrinal research methodology supported by policy and institutional analysis. It reviewed legal instruments, judicial decisions, international human rights frameworks, national health policies, government reports, and scholarly literature on maternal healthcare rights, respectful maternity care, reproductive dignity, and health system accountability.
Findings: The findings revealed that Uganda has a strong normative foundation for person-centered perinatal healthcare through the Constitution, international commitments, judicial interpretation, and national health policies. Nonetheless, these protections remain weakly operationalized at the facility level due to limited enforceability, inadequate accountability systems, resource constraints, workforce shortages, fragmented grievance mechanisms, and persistent social inequalities. The study further found that maternal healthcare policies still place stronger emphasis on mortality reduction and service coverage than on dignity, informed consent, privacy, respectful treatment, and women’s participation in care decisions.
Conclusion: The study concludes that Uganda’s challenge lies not in the absence of legal and policy recognition, but in the weak translation of these commitments into respectful and rights-based maternal healthcare practice. Person-centered perinatal healthcare, therefore, remains both a public health concern and a legal-governance issue requiring stronger accountability, institutional responsiveness, and enforceable standards.
Recommendations: The article recommends the development of enforceable respectful maternity care standards, stronger grievance redress systems, mandatory rights-based maternal care training for healthcare workers, improved facility oversight, and better integration of dignity, informed consent, privacy, confidentiality, and women’s participation into maternal health monitoring systems.
Keywords: Legal, Policy Dimensions, Person-Centered, Perinatal Healthcare, Uganda
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