Improving HIV/AIDS Services in Northern Sudan
Through collaborative partnerships in Sudan, our projects have improved the health system by working from the national policy level down to the community level.
In June 2006, the Sudanese Federal Ministry of Health invited us to be a technical partner to support the Sudan National AIDS Program (SNAP) in scaling up programs in HIV/AIDS treatment. We have also established partnerships with the National Reproductive Health Program and the National Tuberculosis Program to strengthen the integration of HIV services as well as maternal and child health services.
On the national level, we worked with SNAP and the Federal Ministry of Health to develop:
• Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices (KAP) survey of health care providers
• Programmatic guidelines to evaluate prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) and VCT and ART programs, and condom distribution strategies
• Trainings to prevent health care workers from stigmatizing HIV-positive patients (modules for both trainers and participants)
• Standard operating procedures for patient flow and clinical management in the PMTCT program
• Best practices in Sudan's AIDS program to document success stories and lessons learned among health providers in various states
• Provider-Initiated Testing and Counseling (PITC) to increase the uptake of HIV test acceptance
• Guidelines for treating sexually transmitted infections
• Operations Research workshops for health care workers and managers to improve efficiency and effectiveness of health programs
• National HIV strategic plan (2010-2014)
At local health facilities, we support "de-verticalization" of the HIV program by integrating HIV activities within routine health facility services and increasing the involvement of hospital management. This has both increased the effectiveness of the overall health services offered and helped reduce stigma around HIV/AIDS treatment.
Before our HIV/AIDS project in Sudan, the PMTCT program was only a pilot project in select sites and was not integrated into routine health care. HIV services were separate from routine antenatal and maternity care and only 4% of pregnant women were being tested. We have worked with SNAP in 10 states of northern Sudan, and testing acceptance rates have shot up to 60% or more in the program area.
Working on both the management of care at the facility level as well as developing effective guidelines for treatment on the national and state level, together with the Federal Ministry of Health and SNAP we have increased the capacity of local health facilities, the confidence of clients receiving care, and directly improved the quality of people's lives.
This project is funded by WHO and UNICEF.