Kenya’s Arid and Semi-arid Lands (ASAL) experience regular droughts and floods, as well as seasonal spikes in hunger, culminating in nutrition emergencies. There are two types of malnutrition: acute and chronic malnutrition .
The Ministry of Health Kenya (MoHK) approved the Integrated Management of Acute Malnutrition (IMAM) in 2009.
Disease-related malnutrition and insufficient food consumption are the most common acute causes of malnutrition in poor and middle-income nations.
Therefore, malnutrition continues to be a major public health issue that affects the entire population, but especially vulnerable populations including children under the age of five, expectant and nursing mothers, and people with illnesses like HIV and TB.
Research studies based on evidence have revealed that IMAM is the most successful way to treating malnutrition and improving the nutritional condition of children in communities in recent years. There is a need to build and scale up IMAM using a method that integrates with and strengthens existing systems.
Gabriel Lerantilei, Nutrition Officer -SWT
IMAM consists of four components:
1. SAM inpatient care
2. SAM outpatient management
3. Moderate Acute Malnutrition (MAM) management
4. Mobilization of the community.
These elements are tied to health-care delivery platforms.
To help the target population, which includes cases in facilities and communities suffering from undernutrition, improve its nutrition outcomes, healthcare professionals and community health volunteers should be able to comprehend and apply these principles.
This IMAM training is being provided by SWT to give healthcare professionals, such as community health assistants/volunteers and humanitarian field assistants, the technical know-how to manage straightforward instances of acute malnutrition.
The Samburu County Government healthcare employees, community health assistants and volunteers, program assistants, and nutrition technical staff are all participating in the IMAM training together with NGO partners (Nawiri & Action Against Hunger – ACF).
An essential set of nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive interventions must be put into place and scaled up as a package to address all kinds of undernutrition.
A more comprehensive and long-lasting solution to improving child nutrition should be offered by treating both the immediate and underlying causes of malnutrition.
If stakeholders are able to do they’ll create an environment that is more conducive to coping with and adapting to the new and changing conditions like climate change, a surge in humanitarian crises, high and unstable food prices, urbanization, population expansion & nutrition transition etc.
Participants in SWT’s ongoing IMAM training are engaged through group work sessions, PowerPoint presentations, articles, publications, tests, and evaluations.
