7th Annual Pre-APHA Workshop on Community-Based Primary Health Care
Saturday, 6 November 2005
New Orleans, Louisiana

Community-Based Primary Health Care: Practical Steps to Achieve Successful
Programs

The Working Group on Community-based Primary Health Care (part of the
International Health Section of the American Public Health Association) is
pleased to announce that it will hold a day-long workshop in New Orleans
on the Saturday 6 November 2005 from 8:30 AM until 5:00 PM. This is the
day before the opening of the annual meeting of the American Public Health
Association. This is the seventh consecutive workshop that our Working
Group has sponsored. We are still working to determine the location. There
will be no formal charge, but we will be pleased to accept voluntary
contributions. You do not have to be a member of APHA to attend, nor do
you have to be registered for the APHA annual meeting.

This year, we are pleased to announce that Dr. Stanley Foster of Emory
University and Drs. Warren and Gretchen Berggren, international public
health consultants, will be leading our workshop. Both the Dr. Berggrens
and Dr. Foster are recipients of the esteemed Lifetime Achievement Award
in International Health given by the International Health Section of the
American Public Health Association.

In the morning session, participants will strengthen their skills by using
community- generated data to identify health issues and to identify
implementation strategies. Data to be used are from a pastoral population
in southern Ethiopia collected by the Liben District Team/Save the
Children (US) WomanWise Child Survival Project. Unique features of this
project include Bridge to Health Teams working at the community level, the
training of birth attendants in life-saving skills, quality improvement of
preventive and curative services, and community-based case management.
Participants will have the choice of working with one of three sets of
data: maternal health, facility services, and community services including
community management of childhood illness. In a simulation of
district-level planning, the participants will analyze data and discuss
their findings within small groups. Facilitators will include Dr. Lynn
Sibley, a nurse-midwife and anthropologist from Emory's School of Nursing;
Dr. Tedbab Degefie, Project Manager of the Liben WomanWise Project in
Ethiopia, and Dr. Stanley Foster, Professor of Global Health, Emory's
School of Public Health.

In the afternoon session, the Berggrens will provide examples from their
recent personal experiences in Mozambique and Haiti. The issues that they
will address include:
" Difficulties that facility-based programs have in reaching out
into the community.
" The tendency to focus on process rather than impact indicators.
" The tension between facility-based integrated management of
childhood illness
" and the goal of expanding coverage of basic services within an
underserved
population.
" The tension between the goal of reaching the poorest of the poor
within the population and the goal of generating local income to ensure
the long-term sustainability of primary health care programs.

Warren and Gretchen Berggren have had extensive field experience in Africa
and Haiti and they have worked with many international health
organizations in leadership roles, most notably at the Hospital Albert
Schweitzer in Haiti, Save the Children (US), and World Relief. They are
currently providing technical support to community-based primary health
care projects around the world, with a primary focus on Haiti.

Stan Foster is Professor of Global Health at the Rollins School of Public
Health of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. He worked for many years
with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in leadership roles in
international health programs, most notably in smallpox eradication and in
the strengthening of immunization programs. More recently, he has been
involved in the teaching of international health and in providing
technical support to community-based primary health care programs
throughout the developing world.

We believe this will be an exciting participatory learning opportunity for
those of us who are interested in and committed to community-based primary
health care. As in the past, this workshop will be, in addition, an
opportunity for networking and for nurturing nascent interests in
community-based primary health care. Those new to community-based primary
health care, including students, are welcome.

As further details become available, we will share them with you.

We hope you will save the date and make plans to attend.

Feel free to share this with anyone you think might be interested.

Space is limited to 70, so register now by sending an email to our
Registrar, Mirlene Italien Perry at mitalien0409@... and letting her
know you plan to attend.

For further information, contact any of the three Workshop Coordinators:

Paul Freeman (freeman.p.a@...)
Mirlene Italien Perry (mitalien0409@...)
Henry Perry (henry@...)