About 20 health workers participated in a non-communicable disease training workshop hosted by the Foundation for Rural Integrated Enterprises and Development (FRIEND) Fiji through funding provided by the New Zealand Government.
While opening the workshop on Wednesday in Tuvu, Lautoka, Ministry of Health and Medical Services Head of Wellness Dr Devina Nand said community health workers played an important role in NCD awareness.
“What we do as a program is we focus on picking up these cases early so that means screening them, checking their blood pressure, their sugar and other screenings like breast and cervical cancer screening,” she said.
“The earlier we detect, the earlier we can treat.
“That is one aspect and the other aspect is making sure that people are aware of what they need to do and it’s called health literacy, meaning you need to be aware of the factors that affect your health and how they affect your health and the community needs to be aware of this.
“As community health workers you must know what your country is like before you can move to correct the mistakes that we are making.”
FRIEND Fiji director Sashi Kiran said community outreach programs would soon be carried out by the NGO in Lautoka and Ba.
She said the programs would include NCD screenings and tests by nurses. She added that the wellness outreach would also determine the number of NCD-related cases within their target areas.
