My Intro to ICAP

As soon as I got to Maputo, I was off and running. I spent my first two days here in a workshop being given by some colleagues from the NY office on ICAP’s new “Clinical Systems Mentorship” approach to the work they are doing (it’s based on the idea of clinical mentorship, but trying to adapt that idea to working with whole health facilities).

Following the workshop, I sat through a week-long peer educator training. ICAP supports clinics and hospitals to provide better care and treatment for people living with HIV/AIDS and their partners and families. The idea with the peer educators is to have them present in the waiting rooms where they can interact with patients, providing information on HIV/AIDS, Antiretroviral Therapy, prevention, etc. and also share their personal experiences (the peer educators are all HIV+ and most are on ART). The training was a pretty amazing experience. First of all, it gave me a good introduction to the work that ICAP’s Adherence and Psychosocial Team is doing. And secondly, it was very moving to hear a room full of people stand up, introduce themselves, and announce that they are HIV+ and receiving their treatment from Hospital X....particularly in a country where there is still so much stigma surrounding HIV/AIDS.

This week finds me, for the first time, actually in the office with a chance to sit and catch my breath. The exact details of my workplan are still yet to be determined.....my boss has been stuck for the past two days in a meeting at the Ministry of Health, but she has assured me that is her first priority when she gets free.