Family Planning and PMTCT Services

Excerpts from the summary

The summary focuses on the findings from Horizons studies on the extent to which voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) and prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission (PMTCT) programmes address family planning, and vice versa. In Kenya and Zambia, the Horizons Programme collaborated with Network for AIDS Research in East and Southern Africa (NARESA) and the Mother-to-Child transmission of HIV (MTCT) Working Group, respectively, and UNICEF to document the acceptability, operational barriers, costs, and impact of pilot PMTCT services. The major research activities in each country included tracking the utilisation of various services, including VCT and family planning; following a cohort of clinic users for 12 to 18 months to determine the effect of PMTCT service utilisation on knowledge, practices, and rates of mother-to-child HIV transmission; observation of the quality of care delivered by providers and an economic analysis of the PMTCT programme.

This summary also draws on data from a Horizons study in Uganda that tested a strategy for the integration of HIV counseling into health services, including family planning, and from a recent evaluation of United Nations-supported pilot PMTCT projects in 11 countries. In the Uganda study, researchers used a combination of methods to determine the extent to which providers assessed client needs, discussed HIV-related issues, and made referrals for such related services as VCT. In the UN study, UNICEF and Horizons employed a mix of qualitative and quantitative methodologies, including a rapid assessment of services at pilot sites in Rwanda and Zambia, to identify strengths as well as gaps in service.