In this NAPWHA and Positive Women Victoria-hosted event, women living with HIV are invited to come and learn about the latest advice and guidance on breastfeeding.
This national online community forum will be moderated by Heather Ellis, co-author of Breastfeeding for women living with HIV in Australia resource (soon to be published in May 2021) which was developed in collaboration with NAPWHA and Positive Women Victoria. This community resource can also to be used in conjunction with clinical Guidance for the care of women living with HIV in Australia who are considering infant feeding options produced by ASHM (Australasian Society for HIV, Viral Hepatitis and Sexual Health Medicine) also soon to be published in 2021.
Speakers available to answer your questions about breastfeeding as a woman living with HIV include:
Melania Mugamu – HIV peer support worker in Australia. Melania is living with HIV and a qualified social worker with more than 10 years experience working within the HIV community in Zimbabwe where many of her clients were women living with HIV who breastfed their infants.
Dr Fiona Bisshop – HIV specialist doctor from Brisbane with a strong focus on gender and HIV medicine. Fiona is a member of the ASHM ARV guidelines sub-committee and is also very knowledgeable about pregnancy and breastfeeding for women living with HIV.
Kate Bath – ASHM HIV/STI program manager and sub-committee secretariat for the ASHM Guidance for the care of women living with HIV in Australia who are considering infant feeding options.
Registration to attend this online event is essential.
0:00 Heather Ellis introduction and promo for NAPWHA/Positive Women community resource
02:39 Introducing community panellist, Melania Mugamu
04:41 Introducing Kate Bath; ASHM clinical guidance for healthcare providers
07:42 Introducing Dr Fiona Bisshop; and what is person-centred healthcare
09:36 Question: “In some cultures there is an expectation to breastfeed… but if I do not breastfeed I am effect effectively disclosing my HIV.” What could women say if someone asks, why you are bottle feeding versus breast feeding?
13:44 “If I decide to breastfeed, I’m worried I will become anxious by my decision, even though the risk is very small”. What is the information from the PROMISE Study?
16:14 Who is part of a HIV healthcare team? What are their roles?
In this video episode of Let Women Talk, HIV community advocate Sarah Feagan speaks with Dr. Allison (Allie) Carter, a Lecturer in Sexual Health at the Kirby Institute, UNSW Sydney, from the 2019 Australasian HIV&AIDS Conference held in Perth on 17-19 September about. Allie has been engaged in research at the intersection of sexuality, health, and human rights for nearly a decade, with a focus on the lives of women. She is the founding co-editor of Life and Love with HIV, a blog and online community for women and couples around the world to share stories of sexuality, romance, and love.
About Life and Love with HIV
Life and Love with HIV is a blog and online community dedicated to de-stigmatising sexuality and relationships among women, partners, and couples living with HIV by shifting the focus from risk to pleasure. In creating our own stories, in our own voices, with our own words, our goal is to reclaim our sexual rights around the world.
But Beyoncé wasn’t built in a day! Turning this idea into action happened over the course of three years. We hosted several sex-positive workshops with women. We also scoured the web, collecting what little resources we could find. And we started community building, eventually recruiting a diverse team of writers from around the world with the help of social media. What began as a small grassroots, volunteer-run effort in British Columbia, Canada, slowly transformed into the global platform it is today.
Find out about Let Women Talk
Let Women Talk is a NAPWHA community-led health literacy initiative where HIV community advocates incorporate their rich perspectives and diverse lived HIV experiences back into strengthening community health responses — where women design and develop the health content and interventions that they want to see and hear. The initiative is one of many activities forming part of the HIV Health Literacy Framework Project, a NAPWHA project supported through the funding of ViiV Healthcare Australia.
Allie Carter is a feminist author, speaker, activist, and researcher — engaged in research to advance women’s sexual health and rights for nearly a decade, with a particular focus on hidden and under-served communities. She received her MPH and PhD at Simon Fraser University in Canada and worked previously at the British Columbia Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS. She is presently a Lecturer in Sexual Health at the Kirby Institute at the University of New South Wales. Allie has published over 30 scientific articles and her work has appeared in CBC, CTV, The Star, Ravishly, and much more. She has a deep passion for communicating science through narrative and is currently writing her first book.
Sarah Feagan is a queer women who has been living with HIV since 2008. She is the previous chair of Positive Women Victoria and has recently joined the team at Living Positive Victoria as a Peer Navigator. She also the Vice President of NAPWHA. Sarah is a co-facilitator of Phoenix for Women and the Positive Leadership Development Institute (PLDi) . Sarah has unique approach to her advocacy and is inspired by the lived experience of the body positive to inform her practice. Sarah’s advocacy spans the from the grass roots all the way up to high level governance. She has a global outlook with a local focus to bringing the community along with her.
In this video episode of Let Women Talk, HIV community advocate Sarah Feagan speaks with Dr Moira Wilson — an infectious diseases consultant working at Fiona Stanley Hospital in Perth, and part of the West Australian HIV positive women’s pregnancy management team. Dr Wilson presented at the 2019 Australasian HIV&AIDS Conference held in Perth on 17-19 September about the updates in management for women who are pregnant living with HIV.
About the presentation
Dr Wilson presented the latest evidence around antiretroviral therapy (ART) use in pregnancy. At the at 10th IAS Conference on HIV Science held in Mexico City in July 2019, results of an expansion of the Tsepamo study in Botswana were presented. While the risk with Dolutegravir (DTG) and neural tube defects appears to be much lower than first thought, the signal still remains. Guidelines are not excluding Dolutegravir as an otherwise excellent choice for use in pregnancy, however, it should be avoided in the first 8 weeks, and hence, avoided in women of childbearing potential who are not using a reliable method of contraception.
Also in this video series is Sarah Feagan & Carole Khawwho speak about a case study with a pregnant woman on DTG.
Hear a Praxhub podcast of Dr Brad McKay from East Sydney Doctors speaking to Dr Sorana Segal-Maurer (Director of Infectious Diseases at New York-Presbyterian Queens Hospital,USA) and Dr Moira Wilson (Fiona Stanley Hospital, Perth) about challenges in the diagnosis and treatment of HIV in women on 18 February 2019 — Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3
Find out about Let Women Talk
Let Women Talk is a NAPWHA community-led health literacy initiative where HIV community advocates incorporate their rich perspectives and diverse lived HIV experiences back into strengthening community health responses — where women design and develop the health content and interventions that they want to see and hear. The initiative is one of many activities forming part of the HIV Health Literacy Framework Project, a NAPWHA project supported through the funding of ViiV Healthcare Australia.
Dr Moira Wilson is an infectious diseases consultant working at Fiona Stanley Hospital in Perth. She has been managing patients with HIV/AIDS since 1986, both in Australia and internationally, and has a strong interest in the holistic management of women living with HIV. She is part of the West Australian HIV positive women’s pregnancy management team.
Sarah Feagan is a queer women who has been living with HIV since 2008. She is the previous chair of Positive Women Victoria and has recently joined the team at Living Positive Victoria as a Peer Navigator. She also the Vice President of NAPWHA. Sarah is a co-facilitator of Phoenix for Women and the Positive Leadership Development Institute (PLDi). Sarah has unique approach to her advocacy and is inspired by the lived experience of the body positive to inform her practice. Sarah’s advocacy spans the from the grass roots all the way up to high level governance. She has a global outlook with a local focus to bringing the community along with her.
In this video episode of Let Women Talk, HIV community advocate Sarah Feagan speaks with Liz Duck-Chong — writer, sexual health advocate, and podcast co-host of Let’s Do It, at the 2019 Australasian HIV&AIDS Conference held in Perth on 17-19 September. Liz tells Sarah about trans[TEST] — a new peer-led, sexual health service for anyone who is trans or gender diverse (TGD) in Sydney.
About trans[TEST]
trans[TEST] is a new peer-led, sexual health service for anyone who is trans or gender diverse (TGD) — a partnership between ACON and the Kirketon Road Centre (KRC). The trans[TEST] model combines trained TGD peers working with sexual health nurses and doctors to deliver HIV and STI testing and other sexual health services. The service operates on the first and third Friday of each month at Clinic 180 in Kings Cross, Sydney, with appointments from 11:30am to 5pm.
Find out about Let Women Talk
Let Women Talk is a NAPWHA community-led health literacy initiative where HIV community advocates incorporate their rich perspectives and diverse lived HIV experiences back into strengthening community health responses — where women design and develop the health content and interventions that they want to see and hear. The initiative is one of many activities forming part of the HIV Health Literacy Framework Project, a NAPWHA project supported through the funding of ViiV Healthcare Australia.
Liz Duck-Chong is a writer, sexual health advocate, filmmaker and transgender bon vivant who writes about the reproductive health, rape politics, girldick, and far more besides. She can be found on Twitter at @lizduckchong, in your ears at @letsdoitpodcast— lizduckchong.com
Sarah Feagan is a queer women who has been living with HIV since 2008. She is the previous chair of Positive Women Victoria and has recently joined the team at Living Positive Victoria as a Peer Navigator. She also the Vice President of NAPWHA. Sarah is a co-facilitator of Phoenix for Women and the Positive Leadership Development Institute (PLDi). Sarah has unique approach to her advocacy and is inspired by the lived experience of the body positive to inform her practice. Sarah’s advocacy spans the from the grass roots all the way up to high level governance. She has a global outlook with a local focus to bringing the community along with her.
