CNMI to host Pacific conference on limb preservation

The CNMI will soon play a significant role in disseminating more information on wound care when it hosts a Pacific conference in April.

Department of Public Health acting Secretary Joseph Kevin Villagomez disclosed Thursday last week that the department would be hosting the conference about wound care for health providers at the Commonwealth Health Center and outside clinics.

The conference will be a first in the Pacific, he added.

The conference will be held on April 9 to 10 at the Sandcastle, Hyatt Regency Saipan. The conference, said physical therapist Dana McFadden, has also been offered to Guam, Palau, Federated States of Micronesia and the Marshall Islands.

McFadden said the conference would be zeroing in on current concepts in wound healing and the presenter would be Jefferey Feedar, a Certified Wound Specialist of Wound Care Associates from Wisconsin.

McFadden said the conference has already signed up more than 50 participants from Saipan and one from Tinian.

“Pohnpei plans to send two participants, the Marshall Islands is interested in sending some staff and 10 participants have tentatively registered from Guam,” she added.

DPH deputy secretary Lynn Tenorio said the conference is intended to improve in many ways health services in the CNMI. Tenorio is a former program manager of the CNMI Diabetes Prevention and Control Program.

McFadden was joined at the presentation by Physical Therapy Department head Pam Carhill.

“The conference is an excellent opportunity to have a multi-disciplinary, multi-island education and me,” said Villagomez. “This forum will serve to unite healthcare providers throughout the Micronesia in the fight for limb preservation.”

McFadden said that course participants would receive certificates of completion that could possibly help toward obtaining a Wound Specialist Certification.

The conference will cost $150 per nursing student, $200 per nursing practitioner and $350 for physicians and podiatrists. Deadline for registration is on Feb. 20.

McFadden said the usual cost for the conference, if held in the United States, would be $450 per participant, regardless of profession and status.

Wound care is particularly apt in the CNMI, with its high rate of diabetes, a disease that sometimes lead to limb amputation when minor wounds that remain unnoticed are left untreated and become infected. The infection leads to gangrene, which requires amputation of the infected limb.

The CNMI has been found to have the largest number of cases of diabetes after Pima Indians and Nauru. Based on 2002 statistics, there are 3,019 known diabetes patients in the CNMI-mostly Chamorros and Carolinians, and Pacific islanders.

For more information, interested individuals may contact McFadden at the CHC Physical Therapy Department at 236-8327 or 236-8327.