Informal health care providers in Nigerian slums: Perspectives on how to link them with the formal health system

Informal healthcare providers (IHPs) play a crucial role in healthcare delivery in urban slums, but the lack of linkages between IHPs and the formal healthcare system results in fragmented, low-quality care. Integrating IHPs into the formal healthcare system poses challenges that are common across such settings. This study explores the perceptions of healthcare providers and consumers in Nigerian urban slums regarding linking IHPs to the formal healthcare system, while also aiming to identify stakeholder perceptions on how the linkage might best work.

Our findings show the majority of consumers (92%) and providers (87%) supported linking IHPs to the formal health system, with favourable responses to:

1) training, supervision, and referral as the main strategies and aspects of services to be linked,

2) having the Ministry of Health lead the linkage, and

3) managing the linkage through government legislation.

The CHORUS study findings offer guidance for future policymaking.

Read the full paper here: Informal health care providers in Nigerian slums: Perspectives on how to link them with the formal health system

Iheomimichineke Ojiakor, Obinna Onwujekwe, Joseph Paul Hicks, Health Policy and Planning, 2025;, czaf068, https://doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czaf068