Last Updated 7.30.07 Copyright 2007 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College.

A fundamental challenge to the delivery of HIV medication in resource-scarce settings is the lack of trained clinicians to diagnose and prescribe the medications. In many of theses settings, nurses are the foundation of any successful HIV treatment expansion program. To address this fundamental challenge, in December 2006 the Harvard Medical School Division of AIDS launched the Global Nurse Training Program (GNTP). The Program will use intensive, creative training approaches and a cadre of specialized, experienced Nurse Preceptors from across Harvard Medical School and its teaching hospital affiliates to capacitate local health delivery systems.
Under the direction of Sheila Davis, ANP who has years of training experience in domestic and international settings, the Program will initially support nurses through clinical mentoring at HIV programs in South Africa as part of mobile nurse support units. Recognizing the international emergency that warrants the rapid scale up of treatment and the critical need for sustained nursing presence in assuring quality follow-up and adherence, GNTP will actively respond to human resource infrastructure shortages and the lack of training in countries most affected. GNTP provides ongoing, short term, and targeted on-the-ground training based on a thorough needs assessment with local collaborators.
The nurses who are part of the mobile nurse support teams are experts in their area of clinical practice from throughout the United States . The employers of these professionals are asked to "loan" their staff to the GNTP for a period of 2-4 weeks per year on an ongoing basis.
For more information about the GNTP, please contact Sheila Davis at sheila_davis@hms.harvard.edu

Picture: Chris Shaw, RN ( MGH ) and Stephanie Ahmed, FNP ( BWH) in KwaZulu Natal Province , South Africa to provide clinical mentoring, training and operational assistance to nurses who are overburdened by health care staffing shortages and the devastating impact of HIV/AIDS. (December 2006).