Media Releases

U of T program helps Brazilian nurses identify ways to improve primary health care

October 26, 2010

TORONTO, ON – The Uni­ver­si­ty of Toronto’s Lawrence S. Bloomberg Fac­ul­ty of Nurs­ing is wel­com­ing a del­e­ga­tion of nurs­es, nurs­ing pro­fes­sors and health­care offi­cials from Brazil this week to share knowl­edge about pri­ma­ry health care.

The vis­it by the high-lev­el del­e­ga­tion is a result of a unique pro­gram that U of T’s Fac­ul­ty of Nurs­ing helped devel­op for two uni­ver­si­ties in the Brazil­ian states of Acre and Mato Grosso do Sul. The Bloomberg Fac­ul­ty, an inter­na­tion­al­ly rec­og­nized leader in nurs­ing edu­ca­tion and research, designed the course for nurs­es lead­ing pri­ma­ry health care teams

The course con­sist­ed of five mod­ules: pro­gram plan­ning and devel­op­ment in the pri­ma­ry health con­text; col­lab­o­ra­tive lead­er­ship, advo­ca­cy and ethics in pri­ma­ry health care nurs­ing; com­mu­ni­ty par­tic­i­pa­tion and com­mu­ni­ty-based research in health; evi­dence-based prac­tice and clin­i­cal case stud­ies in the con­text of pri­ma­ry health care; and con­sol­i­da­tion and devel­op­ment of a com­mu­ni­ty of prac­tice.

Among the del­e­gates are two groups of nurs­es who will present their win­ning course projects at U of T. Each of the two groups earned the top mark in their class. The group from Mato Grosso do Sul focused on iden­ti­fy­ing high-risk preg­nan­cies, and the group from Acre con­cen­trat­ed on strate­gies for pre­vent­ing and man­ag­ing acute res­pi­ra­to­ry infec­tions in chil­dren.

“I am impressed with the groups’ role in pri­ma­ry health care, and their focus on the social deter­mi­nants of health and com­mu­ni­ty par­tic­i­pa­tion,” says Frei­da Chavez, the Direc­tor of the Bloomberg Faculty’s Inter­na­tion­al Office.

This week’s vis­it marks the suc­cess­ful com­ple­tion of the first nurs­ing col­lab­o­ra­tion between U of T’s Fac­ul­ty of Nurs­ing and the Brazil­ian Min­istry of Health, Health Sec­re­tari­ats and the uni­ver­si­ties in the two states. The col­lab­o­ra­tion was fund­ed by the Brazil Fed­er­al Min­istry of Health through the Pan Amer­i­can Health Orga­ni­za­tion.

The Brazil­ian del­e­ga­tion will be at U of T from Octo­ber 25 to 29.

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For more infor­ma­tion, please con­tact:

Frei­da Chavez
416.978.2854
freida.chavez@utoronto.ca