A group of doctors and nurses from Primary health care institutions on the island as well as staff from the Princess Margaret Hospital (P.M.H) on Monday began a two- day advanced training workshop on the care of the diabetic foot.
The training session being held at the Public Service Training Centre in Roseau is organized by the Health Promotion Resource Centre of the Ministry of Health and is a follow up to a basic training exercise which was held last October.
Health Educator of the Health Education Unit, Adora Toussaint in an interview with GIS news revealed that this week’s training will expose participants to a number of elements as it relates to the diagnosis and care of the diabetic foot.
“This time we have taken it a bit further where persons from the Ministry of Health are invited to this program... they will be looking at how to assess a diabetic foot and how to treat a diabetic foot,” she disclosed.
When asked about the specifics of the diabetic foot, the health educator said the diabetic foot refers to ulcers.
“That is to say something is wrong with the foot. There is an infection in that foot and there is now an ulcer there. That is the training that our participants are getting this morning- how to care for a person who comes in with a diabetic ulcer.”
Director of Primary Health Care services in Dominica, Dr. Martin Christmas says this training will better aid health practitioners in assisting diabetic patients to prevent leg amputations.
“We [can] all appreciate that in Dominica we see a number of young people suffering with amputations, sometimes very young people at the most productive stages of their lives. This is why the Ministry of Health has taken this step to complement our diabetic foot care policy through appropriate training of persons to make sure that we don’t have such large incidents of amputations due to diabetic foot complications.”
He said further that the training programme aims to build low cost health care capacity and empower people with diabetes to take better care of their feet.
The programme is being facilitated by a diabetologist from Slovenia, Dr. Vilma Urbancic and her team along with local surgeons Doctors Hendrix Paul, Julian D’Armas and Spencer St. Luce.
The two -day training programme which ends on Tuesday is being done in collaboration with the Rotary Club of Dominica, the Dominica Diabetes Association and the World Diabetes Foundation.