Dr. Azucena Milana-Dayanghirang is an experienced public health leader for more than 30 years and has been a prime mover, team leader and player, facilitator and trainer of various health programs particularly on Maternal Child Health and Nutrition and other Communicable and Non-communicable diseases.
She has served the people of Davao as City Nutrition Action Officer of Davao City Nutrition Office from 1991-1995; Chief of the Technical Services Division and Medical Officer VI of the Davao City Health Office from 1996 to 2005; as well as the Provincial Health Officer II and Provincial Nutrition Action Officer of Davao del Sur from 2008 to 2016. During her service in the local government, she was able to impact the health and nutrition of the people of Davao through proper planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of health and nutrition programs, including the Fresh Milk Supplemental Feeding Program, which led to the reduction of protein-energy malnutrition among 0-6-year-old children.
In 2016, she was elected as the National President of the Nutrition Action Officers’ of the Philippines Association, Inc. Shortly after, she was appointed as Deputy Executive Director of the National Nutrition Council (NNC), an attached agency of the Department of Health, Philippines. In August 2019, Dr. Dayanghirang was promoted as the Executive Director of the NNC Secretariat. Currently, she is the ASEAN Health Cluster I Chairperson, Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement Philippines Country Focal Point, Co- Chair of the Inter-agency Task Force on Zero Hunger, and Project Manager of the Philippine Multisectoral Nutrition Project DOH component.