21 November 2019, Cagayan de Oro City – Nutrition and health workers including staff from Local Disaster Risk Reduction Management Office in Northern Mindanao are now equipped on Information Management for Nutrition in Emergencies. The participants were able to acquire knowledge and skills on the basic principles of nutrition information management, how to use the six (6) IM Tools and how to facilitate better collection, processing, analysis, and flow of information for use in decision-making.
The two batches of 3-day regional training for provincial, city and municipal level including Lanao del Sur province of BARMM and its select high-risk municipalities were conducted on November 11-13 and 13-15, 2019 at Pearlmont Hotel, Cagayan de Oro City in partnership with the DOH-Center for Health Development Northern Mindanao. This is part of follow through activities of Training of Trainers for Information Management for Nutrition in Emergencies held last March 23-27, 2019 in Davao City. A total of 39 participants composed of 20 Provincial/City Nutrition Action Officers and District/City Nutrition Program Coordinators were from provinces of Bukidnon, Camiguin, Misamis Occidental, Misamis Oriental, Lanao del Norte, and Lanao del Sur from BARMM and cities of Cagayan de Oro, Iligan and Valencia for Batch 1, while 17 Provincial/City/Municipal Nutrition Action Officers, City Nutrition Program coordinators and nutrition staff from Province of Misamis Occidental with its municipalities of Bonifacio and Tudela, municipalities of Lala, Lanao del Norte, Libertad, Misamis Oriental, cities of Gingoog and Valencia, and DOH Human Resource for Health (HRH) and Nutritionist-Dietitians Deployment Program (NDDPs) of Misamis Oriental in Batch 2.
The six Information Management Tools introduced for Nutrition Cluster are Data Repository, Capacity Mapping Tool Nutrition Initial Needs Assessment (NINA) Tool, Nutrition Cluster (NC) 4Ws, NC Monitoring Tool, and Gap Analysis tool suit with the Philippine settings.
The said trainings were facilitated by Ms. Leah M. Felismino, Nutrition Officer II from the Nutrition Surveillance Division of NNC Central office, Ms. Telesfora G. Madelo, Nutritionist-Dietitian IV of DOH-CHDNM, Ms. Liwayway S. Llorico, Nutrition Officer II, NNC X and Ms. Angelique Jean Maggay, ND II, DOH CHDNM (assigned in NNC X) as secretariat. The activities were also graced by Gladys Mae S. Fernandez, Nutrition Program Coordinator who reminded the participants that organized, and prompt nutrition information management is critical for effective and timely nutrition response during emergencies or disasters.
The local nutrition clusters commit to be proactive on its vital roles – efficient coordination with other clusters, provides nutrition response, address gaps, information management and monitoring and evaluation. A re-entry plan was developed by the participants per province, city and municipality as one of their training outputs.
The equipped Information Management Officers vowed to take the lead in all steps of Information management by ensuring the essential data and information for the Nutrition Cluster are available, accessible, and reliable. (Liwayway S. Llorico, Nutrition Officer II)
