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More HIV and AIDS Sites accredited in the North West
2004-04-08

More sites have been accredited as service points for the Comprehensive Plan for Management, Care and Treatment of HIV and AIDS. This brings to 32 the number of health facilities that have been accredited in the country. All the newly accredited sites are in North West province and they are as follows: District Hospital Southern Klerksdorp Tshepong Central Mafikeng Bophelong Bojanala Rustenburg

More sites have been accredited as service points for the Comprehensive Plan for Management, Care and Treatment of HIV and AIDS. This brings to 32 the number of health facilities that have been accredited in the country.

All the newly accredited sites are in North West province and they are as follows:

District Hospital
Southern Klerksdorp
Tshepong
Central Mafikeng
Bophelong
Bojanala Rustenburg

The accreditation team is currently visiting health facilities in the Eastern and will proceed to Western Cape. 

The Department of Health is intensifying its efforts to address the major challenges in the national health system that have been unveiled by the evaluation of facilities through the accreditation process. 

The problems that are being addressed include: 
(a) Lack of a good patient information system 
(b) The provincial health information systems that do not talk to each other 
(c) A comprehensive network of laboratory services at the point of service 
(d) The recruitment and retention of medical, nursing and pharmacy staff and 
(e) A baseline survey to establish our starting point.

The department is concerned about the state of readiness of the service sites and the need to ensure that training on the comprehensive plan is conducted in line with the recently approved national treatment protocol and guidelines. We are therefore making every effort to address these deficiencies and to strengthen the national health system, as a whole.

The mentioned facilities in the North-West will begin to enroll patients. This includes, amongst others: 

HIV testing, medical examination and performing laboratory tests such as CD4 counts and viral load, to assess the clinical stage and establish the progression of the disease.

Providing interventions that delay the progression of the disease, including nutritional and micronutrient supplementations, providing complementary and traditional medicines and improving step down referral facilities for patients. 

Ensuring that patients who qualify and prefer antiretroviral therapy are prepared for treatment, which means undergoing a treatment literacy programme to ensure that when they commence treatment, they will adhere to treatment requirements. (Source: Press release, Ministry of Health, 08 April 2004)

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