Using ART Grain Sack Charts: A Discussion Guide for Community Liaison Volunteers

This 20-page discussion guide is meant to be used by Community Liaison Volunteers (CLVs) in conjunction with ART (anti-retroviral therapy) grain sack charts, a set of charts produced to encourage discussion around various thematic areas of concern for people living with HIV, including nutrition, prevention for positives, ART adherence, prevention of mother-to-child infection, and stigma. Produced by Joint Clinical Research Centre (JCRC) and Health Communication Partnership (HCP) of the Johns Hopkins University Center for Communication Programs (JHUCCP), with financial support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the discussion guide is designed to help CLVs facilitate small group discussions with community members to increase awareness of and the importance of adherence. For each grain sack chart, there is a set of Learning Objectives and Group Discussion Questions, as well as suggestions for take-home messages.

The guide contains discussion suggestions based on the following twelve charts:

• Chart 1: What is a good diet? What is a bad diet?
• Chart 2: Which foods keep you healthy?
• Chart 3: It takes three stones to cook
• Chart 4: I take my ARTs...
• Chart 5: Choices for safer lifestyles
• Chart 6: The price of choosing unsafe lifestyles
• Chart 7: What is stigma and discrimination?
• Chart 8: Your body before and after HIV
• Chart 9: When does a person start ARVs?
• Chart 10: The role of CLVs
• Chart 11: When can HIV be passed from mother to child?
• Chart 12: Caring for HIV positive children