It is irritating for a patient to wait in long queues for medical care at health facility. Either this results into postponement of treatment or neglected attitude from the patient.
Civil Society Community together with The Ministry of Health (MoH) has improvised Differentiated Service Delivery(DSD) models to improve on the quality and effective service delivery at health facilities. HIV Care and treat services will be brought closer to the people either at door to door initiative or at community level.
Gift Miradadi, Business Development Officer at International Community of Women Living With HIV in Eastern Africa (ICWEA) addressed journalists at the 23rd Science cafe held last 6th September 2017 premises of Health Journalist Network in Uganda , “To achieve the ambiguous 90 90 90 target by 2030, we need to discard long queues at health facilities. We have seen the models work for The Aids Support Organization (TASO) and Infectious Disease Institute before and now we plan to put it in place.”
He added that bringing services near the people leads to more adherence.” The models have been implemented in Tanzania, South Africa and Zimbabwe with clear structures and documentation that has worked for them.”
On August 24th, the technical working team at the MoH met with a few members from Civil Society Community, and a consent form was developed for a support group to protect the health worker on grounds of confidentiality and human Rights.
“Guidelines were rolled out for test and treat, thus the models will prove to provide comprehensive HIV treatment, help retention and compliance and most importantly enroll 90% into HIV care,” says Salome Atim, An advocate at National Forum for people living with HIV and Aids Network in Uganda.
They are majorly two models that include the community client led at delivery that involves a targeted group of people located within the same proximity to monitor each other’s clinical output, provide psychological support and pick drugs on a rotational basis from the community.
Well as for the community drug distribution point; community outreaches are practiced in hard to reach areas for instance highlands and pastoral areas.
However infected pregnant women and victims suffering from infections like Tuberculosis will continue to access treatment from the health center so that they are easily monitored as opposed to stable clients who know their line of treatment and have their viral loads suppressed.