How to adapt provider bias interventions through co-creation and storytelling

Youth in Nampula, Mozambique face stigma, judgment, and neglect when seeking sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) services, largely due to provider bias rooted in personal attitudes, societal norms, and systemic constraints within health facilities. Adolescent girls in particular report poor treatment, lack of confidentiality, and judgement. To address this, the Todas Avante project in Nampula makes SRH services more adolescent friendly, gender responsive and inclusive for young people. The project adapts the Beyond Bias intervention, previously implemented in Tanzania, Burkina Faso, and Pakistan and uses youth driven design to co-create solutions with users, rather than for them. The intervention reframes bias as a complex social challenge rather than an individual moral failure, to be explored and addressed collaboratively. It is deeply rooted in the local context through a deliberate process of adaptation with youth and providers.

This skills building session will show participants how to apply Human-Centered Design (HCD) principles to adapt the Beyond Bias model to their contexts. Through a case study from Mozambique, and design-thinking activities such as storytelling, role-play, and journey mapping, participants will learn practical skills to identify and address provider bias, engage youth meaningfully, and create inclusive SRHR services. Participants will leave with tools, guides and stakeholder mapping templates, to replicate and scale this approach. This session is designed to showcase a model that can be replicated and adapted to other contexts to improve SRH outcomes, dismantle systemic barriers to care, and build inclusive, youth-responsive SRH services.