Due to the lack of home-based care services at the community level, family members automatically become the primary caregivers for persons with severe disabilities, limiting their employment and personal opportunities. To improve this situation, USAID's Hold My Hand project is providing home-based care training to provincial teachers and health workers in Binh Dinh and Quang Nam provinces, who in turn will train family caregivers. In the last week of June, 67 family caregivers and home-based care collaborators participated in a week-long training, and two online training classes were held for family caregivers in Binh Dinh province. In addition, the project also set up 15 commune monitoring teams, including commune health workers and social workers, to track data and monitor the progress of persons with severe disabilities who receive home-based care. To date, 49 community collaborators have been trained to use the online monitoring app “REDCAP" to track the progress of caregivers and persons with disabilities.
So What? USAID and its implementing partners are establishing the foundation for home-based care services for families of persons with severe disabilities through new training programs, thus improving the quality of life of persons with severe disabilities and their family members.
