Washington File Profiles BroadReach Healthcare’s HIV/AIDS Treatment Work in South Africa
The Washington File on Friday profiled BroadReach Healthcare, a U.S.-based company founded in 2002 that is working to institute a large-scale antiretroviral treatment program in South Africa. BroadReach -- which received $4.1 million in 2005 from the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and is expected to receive the same amount in 2006 -- has formed an international partnership, called ARVCare, with Cape Town, South Africa-based Aid for AIDS, the world's largest HIV/AIDS disease-management company. Through ARVCare, BroadReach is helping to upgrade antiretroviral drug delivery from a "cottage industry" to a "quality-conserving mass production," the File reports. BroadReach's model uses a network of 4,500 community-based health care professionals, private laboratories and a national mail-order pharmacy system to better serve people living in rural areas. BroadReach since June has established 27 treatment centers in eight communities across three South African provinces; educated more than 1,000 patients and program facilitators on antiretroviral treatment methods; and provided more than 500 people with antiretroviral treatment. The company plans on establishing public-private partnerships with provincial governments to expand the number of people government-run hospitals can treat by moving some patients to the care of community-based physicians. The physicians can consult with a central facility located in Cape Town that is staffed by HIV/AIDS specialists, case managers, nurses, pharmacists and data-entry specialists. The central staff use a computerized patient information management system that links every part of the network and assists physicians in rural areas with patient care and helps patients receive the education they need for successful treatment. BroadReach President and CEO John Sargent said that public-private partnerships are "part of our whole approach, which is finding innovative solutions to provide scalable programs" (Pellerin, Washington File, 12/2).
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