Home Based Life Saving Skills Workshop- October 11 - October 15, 2010.

ACNM Home Based LSS Workshop in Tucson, Arizona
Workshop Number 13: October 11 - 15 (Arrive October 10 and depart October 16, for 5 fulls days of training )

ACNM is pleased to announce another workshop to learn how to implement

Home Based Life Saving Skills

In most of the developing world, home birth with unskilled attendants is the norm, and maternal and neonatal mortality rates are high. Consequently, there is a great need for an innovative and empowering community-based program with certain characteristics. The program must take into consideration the social context of childbirth, focusing on the pregnant woman, her family caregivers, and home birth attendant. It must also address the challenges in responding to unexpected yet common life-threatening complications, including problem recognition, emergency first aid care, timely referral decision making, and health seeking. Finally, it must enhance rather than replace existing care practices, while negotiating safe, feasible, and acceptable actions that will be taken in the home setting when life-threatening complications occur (Sibley 2001).

ACNM has developed such a program… it is the Home Based Life Saving Skills Program. It has been pre-tested in India, field tested in Ethiopia, and implemented in Haiti, Bangladesh, Liberia, Afghanistan, Ghana, Vietnam, Gaza and the West Bank, Tibet, Uganda, Guatemala, Peru, Kenya, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Angola. 

More than 140 people have attended the previous 11 workshops, and now, a few more dedicated women's health care professionals will have an opportunity to participate in Workshop No. 12.  We look forward to seeing you in sunny Tucson this summer!

Comments from previous participants in HBLSS Workshops:

• Listening to the voice of the community is important in program design.  Unfortunately many beautiful, inspiring programs are created and fail because they simply are designed to function in a way that is not feasible.  HBLSS can be adjusted in each place it is to be implemented. It uses community input, participation and partnership to create what is needed. 
• I enjoyed meeting others with like desires and with those who have experience "in the field". 

Workshop Details                                                                                                                                                                                                     Goal and Objectives
Content Outline of Session
Sessions
Faculty
Field Experience
Logistics
Workshop Dates
Registration and Payment
Cancellation Policy

Goal

The Home Based Life Saving Skills (HBLSS) workshops will help participants to develop competence and confidence in teaching HBLSS using the step-by-step HBLSS process and performing the HBLSS life-saving skills.

Behavioral Objectives

At the completion of the workshop, the participant will be able to:

• Describe and competently demonstrate the step-by-step training process of conducting Home Based LSS meetings.
• Describe and competently perform the skills as outlined on the Take Action Cards.
• Describe the systems approach to implementing an HBLSS program that incorporates, planning, assessment, preparation, training, monitoring and evaluation
• Describe ways to bridge gaps in understanding in situations where local concepts of illness and care giving practices are different from biomedical concepts and practices.
• Describe and demonstrate the pre/post test method used in HBLSS.
• List 5 woman and 3 newborn complications addressed in HBLSS.
• Summarize the HBLSS program using the Guidelines for Decision Makers and Trainers.

Content Outline of Session

This workshop actively explores the adult learning principles and skills used in the HBLSS manual.  These principles and skills encourage the learner to identify and solve real-life problems.  The participants learn to find solutions to real-life problems of obstetric and newborn emergencies that are safe, acceptable and in many cases sustainable in a home setting with limited resources.

The HBLSS workshop uses the HBLSS process that is based on sharing experiences, examining different possible solutions to real-life obstetric and newborn emergencies in less than optimal conditions, and negotiating solutions that are more likely to be adopted when needed. 

The workshop participants, who are preparing to become HBLSS trainers and consultants, have the responsibility to role-model in the field for those they train to: (1) respectfully consider the ideas suggested by participants, (2) discuss solutions with the relevant decision-makers, and (3) adapt the solutions for the conditions and resources available.  These responsibilities are key to the success and integration of HBLSS in any health care system.

Sessions
During the 5 day workshop, the sessions will follow the HBLSS TOT method of modeling and practice teaching. The HBLSS manual will be used and sessions include:

• Model and practice teach Community Meeting 1: Introduction
• Model and practice conducting pre/post test using the HBLSS Skills Checklist
• Overview of schedule, daily evaluation and adult learning methods
• Model and practice teach Community Meeting 2: Woman and Baby Problems
• Model and practice teach Community Meeting 4: Referral
• Model and practice teach Community Meeting 5: Bleeding Too Much
• Review HBLSS programs in Ethiopia, Liberia and Bangladesh
• Orient to the HBLSS Guidelines for Decision Makers and Trainers
• Assessment and monitoring of an HBLSS program

Faculty:
Diana Beck, CNM, MS is presently a Senior Technical Advisor with ACNM’s Department of Global Outreach. Ms. Beck has practiced full-scope midwifery in a variety of settings, established a midwifery service, and was nurse-midwifery faculty at Georgetown University.  With over 22 years of experience in international maternal and reproductive health programs she has worked in more than 18 countries.  Her international experiences includes program design, implementation, evaluation, training, and curriculum development for traditional birth attendant training, in-service and pre-service training of nurses, midwives and doctors, as well as midwifery association strengthening.  She has field experience in implementing HBLSS in Ethiopia, Haiti and Bangladesh. She is the co-author of the ACNM Home Based Life Saving Skills and Life-Saving Skills Manual for Midwives Fourth Edition, among other training manuals.

Sandra Tebben Buffington, CNM, MPH, PNP, FACNM began her career with ACNM in 1988.  Ms. Buffington is presently Senior Technical Advisor to ACNM.  With over 40 years of experience in international programs, she has trained TBAs in many countries, practiced as a clinical nurse-midwife and nurse practitioner for 13 years in Nigeria, designed community health workers training curricula and conducted training for nurse-midwife clinicians in Lesotho for 5 years and in Uganda for 2 years.  She has co-authored the ACNM Life-Saving Skills Manual for Midwives & Home Based Life Saving Skillsmanual, and implemented the HBLSS field-test in India and Ethiopia, worked with NGOs to expand the HBLSS program to selected areas of Haiti, Liberia, Afghanistan, Ghana, and Tanzania, developed proposals for HBLSS in Amazon Basin, Peru, Cameroon and Southern Sudan. She was inducted in the St. Francis Medical Center College of Nursing Alumni Hall of Fame in 2005 and received the Hattie Hemschemeyer Award in 2006.

Jody Lori, CNM, MS is on faculty at the University of Michigan and a doctoral candidate at the University of Arizona, Tucson.  She has field work experience implementing HBLSS in Guatemala, Ethiopia, Liberia and Zambia.  She has established a course for undergraduate nursing students introducing them to global health care issues with a month long service learning component in Guatemala.  She has been active on the International Health Committee of the American College of Nurse-Midwives and the Education Committee of the International Confederation of Midwives. She was instrumental in establishing the first international placements for nurse-midwifery students at the University of Michigan in Guatemala, Honduras, Puerto Rico, Australia and New Zealand.  Jody has presented at numerous international conferences on her work in Guatemala and Sub-Sahara Africa.  Her dissertation research addresses the high rates of maternal mortality in Liberia.

Michelle Dynes has been a midwife for 9 years. She graduated from Yale University in 2000 and worked in the Yale Midwifery Faculty Practice for two years. For the past 7 years, Michelle has been a midwife at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. While at Mayo, Michelle started a CenteringPregnancy group prenatal care program. More recently, she developed and implemented an antenatal care program designed to meet the needs of the Somali women in pregnancy. The Somali CARES Program for Pregnancy utilizes a group model of care and integrates culturally appropriate teaching strategies including story-telling, role-playing, and discussion of cultural norms. Over the past four years, Michelle has become involved in maternal global health including a master’s degree in Public Health from the University of Minnesota focusing on maternal child global health. She has been an active member of the ACNM International Health Committee, as well as the ACNM Disaster Preparedness Committee. Michelle helped to train and implement HBLSS in Bangladesh in 2007 and returned one year later to conduct a process evaluation. Details of the process evaluation will be available in an upcoming issue of the journal Midwifery. In August of 2009, Michelle traveled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo to conduct a needs assessment of Panzi Hospital where a large number of women are treated for fistula resulting from pregnancy complications and sexual violence. Michelle is currently a PhD student at Emory University with a research focus in maternal and newborn survival in developing countries.

Field Experience
We hope to prepare you to use your HBLSS Skills in the field. If there are opportunities for volunteers with ACNM projects we will let you know. However, we cannot promise field experience or that you will be hired by ACNM.  We will try our very best as opportunities arise to make it happen. If there is opportunity to work with ACNM, your first field experience will most likely be as a volunteer consultant and priority is given to those who have participated in a Home Based LSS workshop.  The average field experience is 4-6 weeks.  There will be more discussion on this during the workshop. 

Logistics
The workshop will be held at Ramada Foothills Hotel, 6944 E. Tanque Verde Road, north-east of Tucson close to the Rincon Mountains, Sabino Canyon, and the Saguaro National Park - East.  The registration cost per person for the workshop is $1200 for ACNM members and $1400 for nonmembers when 2 participants share a double room. Please note that the registration fee does NOT include hotel accomodation. There are additional charges for a single room.  The fee includes breakfast, lunch, happy hour and a catered closing dinner, the 5-day workshop with CEUs, and a full set of the Home Based Life Saving Skills Manual, Guidelines for Decision Makers and Trainers, and teaching aids including learning to make a baby model for demonstrations. Each person is responsible for their own travel expenses.  We do need you to attend the entire workshop, so please make arrangements.

Workshop Dates

Workshop Number 12:
Arrive October 10 and leave October 15 for 5 full days October 11- 16, 2010

The arrival and departure dates are mentioned based on experience and feedback from our previous workshops.  When participants arrive and depart during the workshop, it causes much confusion.  If your schedule will not allow ample time for this workshop, please plan for a later workshop when you will have a more flexible schedule.  Once you have registered, you will receive additional information regarding the shuttle/taxi from the airport to hotel, address, and request for any dietary needs for the lunches.

Registration and Payment
In order to register, please fill out the online registration form and submit your resume.

Cancellations

All cancellation notices must be submitted in writing. Registrants may expect to receive refunds four to six weeks after the conclusion of the workshop. A $50 cancellation fee will be assessed for all cancellations received on or before, August 2, 2010. Between August 3rd and September 20th a fee of 50% of the registration fee will be assessed. After September 20th , cancellations due to extenuating circumstances (i.e. death, accident, and illness) must be submitted in writing, include appropriate verification, and must be received by HBLSS Coordinator, Department of Global Outreach, ACNM by October 10th.   No refunds will be granted for any reason after October 11th 2010