Latina Health Initiative: Promotoras de Salud
| "Your modules are a GODSEND. A friend forwarded the link to me as I was in the process of REINVENTING the WHEEL, preparing to do a training for Parteras in El Salvador on managing obstetric emergencies. Now I don't have to write the "normal" OB material or the family planning piece, and I am SO grateful!" -- a promotoras user |
Información en Español
Under the Latina Health Initiative, Our Bodies Ourselves (OBOS) has developed a peer health-educator (promotoras de salud) training guide based on the Nuestros Cuerpos, Nuestras Vidas (NCNV), the Spanish translation and cultural adaptation of Our Bodies, Ourselves. The aim of the project is to provide Latinas and immigrant women with a family-focused, woman-centered, gender-based, and culture-specific teaching guide for community health education, thereby extending the mission of OBOS of women’s empowerment through health information and education.
The NCNV Promotoras de Salud Training Guide contains topics such as sexuality and reproductive rights, sexually transmitted infections, violence against women, mental health, and childbearing. These topics were generated after a series of open-ended interviews and focus groups conducted with Latino women from the Boston community as well as with leaders of organizations located in various states affiliated with the National Council of La Raza and the Immigrant Women Program of the National Organization for Women, Legal Defense and Education Fund.
The NCNV Promotoras de Salud Training Guide contains a total of eleven modules divided into six training workshops as outlined in the following table. Units 1 and 2 of each module introduce the topic, the objectives, and the role of the promotora de salud. These units establish the ground rules of participatory education methodology where each participant and the facilitator begin the training workshop as equal learners; learning is introduced as an exchange of experiences, knowledge, and information. We hope that this learning process will allow women participating in the training to see their own experiences as a valuable source of knowledge and to view the training as another learning experience conducive to enrichment, growth, and the development of skills.
In March 2003, the Training Guide was added to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention Chronic Disease Prevention Databases (CDP) as part of the CDP databases that provide access to information on chronic disease prevention and health promotion to health professionals.
The Promotoras de Salud Training Guide are posted at our website as .pdf files. They can be download for free. (To do so, click on one of the modules below. A .pdf file of the module will open. To save a copy to your computer, click on the top left icon -- the floppy disc -- on the .pdf toolbar.)
After you have looked at the modules, we would love to hear your feedback.
*Please note: The highlighted modules are posted as .pdf files, which means that you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed on your computer in order to see the module. You can download Adobe Acrobat Reader for free by clicking here.
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You can download the entire guide as one .pdf file. (Beware: this file will download slowly, as it is 4.71 MB!)
The promotoras guide is also available on a CD. To purchase a CD, send $15 (please make out your check to Our Bodies Ourselves) and your name and address to:
Our Bodies Ourselves
5 Upland Road #3
Cambridge, MA 02140
617-245-0200 (phone)
617-245-0201 (fax)
[email protected] |
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