WHO Biennium Activities
As part of the World
Health Organisation (WHO) biennium activities for the year 2006-07, the
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and WHO (India) entrusted the
centre for carrying out various activities in the area of substance use.
While some of the activities were conducted by us, the rest were
conducted by other agencies and were coordinated by us. The activities
are listed below:
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Development of resource material:
Under this activity it was proposed to develop and mass produce
three
manuals to be used as resource material for future training
courses for medical doctors on substance use disorders . Two of
these manuals viz.
Manual on Long-term Pharmacotherapy of Alcohol and Opioid Dependence
and Manual for Nurses on Substance Use Disorders (coming
soon) have been developed by NDDTC, AIIMS. The third,
Manual on Psychosocial interventions is being developed by
NIMHANS, Bangalore.
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Two
National level workshops on specialized topics were conducted. The
first workshop was conducted in August, 2006 on Control of Drug
abuse and HIV risk reduction.
Eminent experts from various governmental and non-governmental
organizations from across the country attended the workshop.
The
proceedings and the final recommendations of this workshop were
reported to the Ministry.
The
second workshop was conducted recently on 22 November 2007 on
Drug and Alcohol Use Treatment Policy.
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Two
Training of Trainers programmes on substance use disorders
have been held at our centre. Each training programme was of two
weeks duration. The first was held in September 2006 and the second
was held in March 2007. Nominations of medical doctors working in
with various state Government run hospitals/ PHC/ CHC were invited
through correspondence with the Directorate of Health services /
Health Commissioners in various states in the country.
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Besides training programmes conducted at our centre,
we also coordinated
Training by Trainers programme at three other
Institutes/centres in the country. These were conducted by RIMS,
Imphal; NIMHANS, Bangalore and KEM, Mumbai. Each training
programme was of one-week duration. The resource persons for the
training course were faculty from the Institute where it was
conducted as well as faculty from NDDTC, AIIMS. Additionally, the
medical doctors trained earlier by our centre were also used as
resource persons.
5.
Drug abuse Monitoring system:
The main
objective of the Drug Abuse Monitoring System (DAMS) was
to develop and establish
a national monitoring system to collect data on treatment seekers
reporting to 122
De- addiction centres, which receive assistance from the Ministry of
Health and Family Welfare. A prescribed proforma is used to collect
data from individuals seeking treatment at each centre.
The data collected at
all the centres is compiled and analysed by NDDTC.
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Newsletter: A Newsletter titled
Drug Abuse: News and views have been prepared
and mass-produced. So far, three issues have been released. Each
issue is theme based viz. (i)
Abuse of Pharmaceutical Drugs; (ii)
Minimum Standard of Care and (iii)
Drug Use and Women. The newsletter is distributed free of
cost to all the trainees undergo training in our centre,
professionals and organizations working in the area of substance
use.
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Evaluation of functioning of De-addiction centres
through Travel and Physical verification was also
carried out. Representatives from Ministry of Health and Family
Welfare and faculty from the centre have made monitoring visits to
DACs in several states with the objective of discussing the
functioning of the De-addiction Centres funded by Ministry of
Health & Family Welfare in the state. Various problems in
functioning and optimal utilization of services were identified and
suggestions were put forth to enhance functioning of the centres.
Site visits were made to the states of Punjab, Himachal Pradesh,
Nagaland, Manipur, Maharastrra, Goa and Gujarat.
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Strengthening of DE-Addiction cell
at Ministry of Health and Family welfare was carried through
provision of equipment and staff.
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