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Exchange/AfriAfya HIV/AIDS Communication Workshop

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Learning 'how to communicate more effectively making the most of limited resources' was the way one participant at this eight-day training workshop on communication, documentation and facilitation skills described the outcome. Organised by the Kenyan-based AfriAfya network and the UK-based Exchange programme (which in early 2006 was subsumed into Healthlink Worldwide), the workshop was help in Kikambala, near Mombasa, Kenya October 22-29 2002. More than 30 participants attended, coming from various facilities around the country.
Communication Strategies

Designed to operate in two parts, the workship first upgraded the skills of 12 facilitators in effective communication, documentation and facilitation approaches. These 12 then planned and ran the second part of the workshop for a further 20 participants drawn from AfriAfya field centres throughout Kenya.

Among the activities undertaken during the workshop were opportunities to meet with a group of community health workers and with young people from the Kikambala area to discuss their knowledge, attitudes and practices around HIV/AIDS and family planning. The findings from those discussions helped participants to identify possible ways of improving communication and documentation.

Development Issues

HIV/AIDS, Family Planning.

Key Points

The workshop focused on how to improve communication around HIV/AIDS. It drew on participants' experience of HIV/AIDS communication and documentation in their communities. It explored:

  • characteristics of good and bad communication
  • challenges faced at community level when communicating around HIV/AIDS
  • the importance of face-to-face communication
  • effective interviewing skills
  • how to prepare and undertake a field visit to identify knowledge, attitudes and practices among specific members of a community
  • how to analyse and present findings from field research to a variety of different audiences using different formats and methods
  • how to critically assess different communication and documentation materials
  • why and how to document experiences and lessons
  • how to make and test effective, appropriate and low cost communication materials


AfriAfya is an African Network for Health Knowledge Management and Communication. It was set up in April 2000 by a consortium of Kenya-based health agencies to explore ways to harness information and communication technologies (ICTs) to improve community health in rural and other marginalised settings. The Network is currently working with financial support from the Rockefeller Foundation and the Partner Agencies.

Exchange (which in early 2006 was subsumed into Healthlink Worldwide) is a networking and learning programme that facilitates effective health communication. Based in the UK, it is supported by the UK Department for International Development (DFID). Kenya is one of its focus countries.

Sources

Healthlink Worldwide website ; and email from Daphne Kouretas to The Communication Initiative on October 5 2006.