Re: [pronut-hiv] Topic 1: Promising Approaches in Nutrition -HIVIntegration

["cener" <cener@wananchi.com>]

Guidelines have been developed in Kenya and the following are the 
experiences and suggestions.

Thank you for taking the opportunity to evaluate the experiences with the 
guidelines. I think it is a very good start to improving overall nutrition 
services.
1. Very few nutritionists were trained to use the guidelines. Most of them 
just received a copy and may be never looked at them considering the amount 
of work they  have to do.

2. Guidelines are developed for national use and to enable all professionals make the same recommendations be it private practice or government and learning institutions. However, I think the private practitioners  have been left out and no arrangement have been made for there training.It is important to include everyone in the implementation and use of the guidelines. When all parties are included the purpose and objective are well met.

3. I think Nurses and clinical officers will benefit from the trainings. We 
know that patients will always ask the person they are most in contact with 
(nurses) questions about nutrition. The nurses are always obliged to give a 
response. This maybe the beginning of sources of nutrition misinformation. 
It is important to include them in the training and implementation.

4. How about fresh graduates leaving the Nutrition colleges and 
universities, how do they get to know about the guidelines? The guidelines 
should be part of the curriculum in the last year of  college so that when 
the graduates complete their courses, they are aware of standards of 
practice.

Is a report and a recommendation going to come out of these discussions?

Thank you.
Kind regards

Alice Ojwang-Ndong
MNutr (Stellenbosch), Nutrition and Dietetic Consultant
Center for Nutrition, Education and Research
P.O.Box 8105 - 00200 Nairobi
Kenya
===============================
Tel: +254-2-2711447 (direct)
Cell: +254-721939067
Email: Cener@wananchi.com
Website: www.cenerkenya.com
" Healthier choices, longer lives"


----- "gladys mugambi" wrote:


Guidelines have been devoped in Kenya and the following are the experiences 
and suggestions.

1.Many health workers do not read guidelines unless they are trained first, 
so trainings have to be scaled up in order for them to use them as 
reference.

2.Supplies of commodities required for proper implementation are lacking, 
and there are no standardized protocols on the use of supplements
3.There is now raised awareness on the link between Nutrition and HIV. The 
Essential Nutrition Actions can be implemented through the HIV/AIDS 
programs. Issues of Infant feeding and complementary feeding, Vitamin A
supplementation and follow up of sick children in OTP,SFP and food security 
can be well intergrated to the program.

4. The screening of children in the communities for malnutrition can help to 
identify families at risk and those that are affected by HIV. This has not 
been put into the guidelines and it is an opportunity to scale
up community nutrition and HIV programs.

Gladys Mugambi
Clinical Nutrition
Ministry of Health,
+254 720791041,
gladysmugambi@yahoo.com


--- "Dr. Robert  Mwadime" <rmwadime@rcqhc.org> wrote:

>
> Now let's discuss our experience and feelings,
> suggestions etc. on integration of (or is it
> "link"?) nutrition and HIV interventions. To help
> facilitate the process of integration, a number of
> countries have developed "guidelines on nutrition
> and HIV/AIDS" (some countries were shy so they
> called it nutrition and "chronic diseases").
>
> I propose that we start by giving our experiences on
> the (development and) use of guidelines on nutrition
> and HIV/AIDS. Are they used in the integration
> process? Are there concerns on the guidelines we
> have? What are the promising issues in use of
> national/international guidelines on nutrition and
> HIV?
>
> Please let us keep to discussions on use of
> guidelines (or policies) and the experiences we
> have.
>
> We shall move to other integration issues soon.
>
>
> Robert Mwadime (Ph.D, MPH)
> Regional Senior Nutrition and HIV/AIDS Advisor
> Academy for Education Development (AED)
> Food and Nutrition Technical Assistance (FANTA)
> Project
> c/o Regional Centre for Quality of Health Care,
> P. O. Box 29140 Kampala, Uganda
> Tel: +256-772-517438, 752-587635, 414-530888
> www.fantaproject/www.aed.org
>
> NB/
>
> We look at integration from two main lenses.
> One, that nutrition services are provided as part of
> care and treatment interventions for PLHIV.
> Initially this was not heard off and many clinicians
> (including funders of programs) were resistant to
> this. Whenever they heard of nutrition, man, they
> interpreted it to imply "food assistance for the
> food insecure". And when nutritionists sat on the
> same table with HIV/AIDS experts they had little to
> share, other than the 4/6 food groups and cookery
> demonstrations. We have come from far as relates
> this definition.
>
> The second lens is that of protection of means of
> livelihood/production (or restoration of resource
> assets) that are the means of food security for the
> household. We have had to improvise new (or old??)
> production techniques (and social networks) and
> sometimes provide food assistance to reach
> households affected (or infected) by HIV in order to
> mitigate against the effects/impact of the disease.
> A lot of resources have been invested in this
> definition but we have a long way to go still.
>
>
>