A huge achievement from NCD program

We conducted the Non Communicable Disease program (NCD) in Duy Xuyen, a rural district in Quang Nam province. Our goal was to trial the protocol in a setting with less resources and presumed lower community knowledge on chronic disease. 

We began with training sessions for the health care providers at all local clinics in the district. We helped the staff to screen for hypertension and diabetes following the protocol that had been developed by our founder Dr Josh Solomon. Bedside training was conducted by our physicians. We equipped these clinics with glucometers, strips, lancets, medication and other supplies. We have continued to do regular follow up with these 3 clinics. We also conducted refresher training for medical staff to share about its effectiveness and the different experiences they have encountered in controlling NCD disease.

Each clinic manages about 30 patients with the medications provided by VNHIP. These patients live in a remote small village accessed by boat. Although they live in peace with picturesque green fields, river and fresh air, they however lack medical knowledge because transport is too difficult to access the center hospital. When they become unwell they are often not aware of what they should do. They listen to the guidance of other people to try many different ways instead of taking prescribed medication. Some of them stop taking medication when they feel better and suffer relapses of their illness.

After six months 3 clinics applied VNHIP’s NCD protocol, Doctors and nurse now have confidence and a sound understanding of how to make NCD’s easy to manage. They report their patients are now attending to their appointments at the clinic on schedule without their reminder. The patients told us that they are happy that they get more education on the diseases, diet, and lifestyle that they were unaware of before.

It was a pleasant surprise when we heard the patients talking to each other about how to control their disease with VNHIP’s NCD protocol. They said that not only do they take medication, they also focus on changing their eating habits and lifestyle. The diabetes patients know the signs of hypoglycemia, do not skip meals, and when working hard they know to have a snack, to control their blood sugar. The patients also said that they share the knowledge they have gained about NCD’s with their immediate and extended families. This is a great achievement for VNHIP.