PRESS RELEASE

United States and Vietnam Work to Improve  Management Skills of Public Health Professionals in HIV/AIDS

June 12, 2007

Seventy-one Vietnamese public health professionals from 24 provinces will finalize their six-month applied management training program from June 11 – 16 in Hanoi, Danang and Ho Chi Minh City.  The focus of this important management training is to use simple health and clinical data collection to continually improve the quality of HIV/AIDS services in order to control the spread of the disease in Vietnam through effective care, treatment, and prevention.  It has been sponsored by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Global AIDS Program, under the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) in Vietnam.  The training is offered in collaboration with the Government of Vietnam by the Hanoi School of Public Health and collaborating partners at the Danang Center for Preventive Medicine and the Ho Chi Minh City Institute for Hygiene and Public Health.

During the three graduation seminars this week, each graduating provincial team will present the results of their applied management improvement projects, showcasing problem-solving skills to improve HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment services through improved management practices.  The graduation workshops in Hanoi, Danang and Ho Chi Minh City provide an opportunity for the teams to examine best practices and to learn from the experiences of the other teams.  The final workshop will be held June 19 - 20 at the Hanoi School of Public Health and will provide additional training for the faculty of the program’s three collaborating institutions on Organizational Excellence.

More than 160 public health professional from 31 provinces have participated in this collaborative program to date. United States and Vietnamese partners plan to expand the program to 49 provinces in the coming year.