Adolescent Girls Health Program
Training Programme for Master
Trainers (TOT) on Personal and Menstrual Hygiene for Adolescent Girls
No, 111, Ilango Nagar, New Chithapudur Coimbatore-641044, Tamil Nadu
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State level training for Master Trainers (TOT) on
Personal and Menstrual Hygiene Practices for Adolescent girls.
”The adolescent girl still remains a young plant
that neither gets light nor water. She remains
the flower that could have blossomed but didn’t…..”
Kamla Bhasin from “Our Daughters”
Background
Adolescent
refers more broadly to the phase of human development encompassing the
transition from childhood to adulthood. In terms of age, it is the period of
life that is extended from 10-19 years, which includes pubertal development
also. This period is very crucial since these are the formative years in t life
of an individual when major physical, psychological and behavioral changes take
place
Girls up to the age of 19 comprise about one-quarter of India ’s population. For young girls
in India ,
poor nutrition, and early childbearing and reproductive health complications
compound the difficulties of adolescent physical development.
On average, most adolescent girls in India have little knowledge of
menstruation, sexuality and reproduction. Large numbers of rural and urban
populations believe that menstruation contaminates the body and makes it
unholy. As a consequence, the girl often sees herself as impure, unclean and
dirty. According to the Nutrition Foundation of India, the average age of
menarche is 13.4; yet 50% of girls aged 12-15 do not know about menstruation.
This is true for rural as well as the urban poor. The lack of information can
be attributed to a veil of secrecy that surrounds menarche.
Anemia is one of the primary contributors to maternal mortality (20-25%)
and is associated with compromised pubertal growth spurt and cognitive
development among girls aged 10-19. Nutritional deprivation, increased iron
demand for adolescent growth, excessive menstrual losses of iron and
early/frequent pregnancies aggravate and exacerbate pre-existing anemia and its
effects. Most girls are not adequately aware of their increased nutritional
needs for growth (especially increasing their food intake to meet calorie
demands of pubertal growth), resulting in girls that are underweight and of
short stature. The poor nutritional status of these adolescent mothers
heightens obstetric risk during pregnancy and childbirth, contributes to
maternal mortality, and puts their infants at risk. Neonatal and infant
mortality rates among adolescent mothers are 60% higher than among infants born
to mothers in the 20-29 age groups.
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Skills India-Profile
Skills India is a
developmental and not for profit organization working towards ensuring
meaningful education and better livelihood opportunity to disadvantaged and marginalized section of
the society.
Our Women empowerment programs focus on integrating the economic, social
and political well being of women and strive to make them aware, empowered,
capable and self reliant.
State level training for master trainers (TOT) on
personal and menstrual hygiene practices for Adolescent girls.
In India ,
school systems are ambivalent about imparting sex education. Even in some
schools where sexual and reproductive health education exists in the
curriculum, teachers are often too embarrassed and uncomfortable to effectively
instruct. This results in the lack of knowledge about the process of
reproduction and menstruation and leads to a greater health problem in our country.
The solution to this problem lies in imparting the knowledge of menstrual
management and reproductive hygiene to adolescent girls.
In this context Skills India organized workshop cum training programme
for master trainers on menstrual hygiene management. Training was imparted to
NGO workers, teachers, health activists and other volunteers from diverse
backgrounds.
The Session Inauguration
The workshop imparted them with knowledge and confidence to educate the in
school and out of school adolescent girls in their neighborhood on menstrual
hygiene and management. Representatives from twenty two districts of Tamil Nadu
including Coimbatore , Erode, SSalem, Ariyalur, Kanchepuram,
Perambalur, Sivaganga, Ramanathapuram, Dindukal, MaduraiCuddalore, Vilupuram, Vellore , Nilgris and
Namakkal participated in the training programme. The training programme
discussed the such as Physical and physiological changes during adolescence,
the prevailing myths regarding menstruation
the menstrual hygiene, the relation between good menstrual practices and
healthy living and methods of using and disposing sanitary napkins and good
food habits. Through this network of NGOs and trained volunteers Skills India
aims impart the menstrual management training and improve the livelihood,
sanitation and health indices of twenty five thousand adolescent girls by the
end of the year 2012.
The session in progress:
Experts from diverse fields trained the participants
Participants in discussion: Group
activity is an integral component of the training Programme
excellent work
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