The Paediatric AIDS Treatment for Africa (PATA) has its roots in Groote Schuur Hospital (GSH), Cape Town, South Africa. One to One Children’s Fund, a United Kingdom based organisation, was funding a much needed antiretroviral therapy (ART) pilot project for 250 families. The project demonstrated extraordinary results and boosted the case for sharing GSH’s treatment model with treatment facilities across Africa. In 2004, One to One Children’s Fund and GSH organised for treatment teams from other regions in sub-Saharan Africa to visit the GSH model in action. From this visit, the first PATA Forum was conceived and the PATA network established.
Today, PATA is an action network of 243 multidisciplinary paediatric HIV treatment teams – frontline healthcare workers -from 24 sub-Saharan African countries, whose overarching goal is to promote and facilitate improved healthcare for HIV-infected children and their families. PATA sets out to achieve this goal by building the capacity of the healthcare workers in its network. PATA promotes models of care that address the medical, psychosocial and material needs of the child and that offer high quality, integrated, patient-centred and affordable services. The PATA head office, located in Cape Town, South Africa, is a nonprofit organisation (NPO) registered in South Africa (NPO 090-092) and works collaboratively with the paediatric HIV treatment teams within the PATA network, serving as a resource to support achievement of their stated goals. Together, PATA teams care for 168 985 children on antiretroviral therapy.
One of PATA’s key activities is convening continental, regional and local forums -collaborative meetings of the multidisciplinary paediatric HIV treatment teams in the PATA network. At each PATA Forum, treatment teams come together to learn from world experts and share models of best practice. Key to the PATA forum is knowledge translation, which allows teams of healthcare professionals to incorporate evidence-based information and examples of best practice into their own daily practice in such a way as to optimise treatment outcomes and benefit the healthcare system as a whole. The structured workshop process culminates in each team creating a PATA Team Grid, detailing 3-, 6- and 12-month quality improvement goals for their healthcare facility. After participation in a PATA Forum, teams enter the PATA Building Bridges Mentoring and Twinning Programme, whereby each team is matched with a PATA mentor (an expert with context-appropriate experience in a relevant field) and a companion team (a PATA network team who has achieved success in a similar field). Since 2004, a total of 249 multidisciplinary treatment teams (996 frontline healthcare workers) from 24 sub-Saharan African countries have participated in six PATA continental, two regional and 15 local forums.
Another key PATA initiative is the Expert Patient Programme, in which people living with HIV (usually caregivers of their own children living with HIV) are integrated into the multidisciplinary paediatric HIV treatment team through employment as ‘Expert Patients’. The Expert Patient Programme was recently nominated as one of the world's top 100 innovations for the next century by the Rockefeller Foundation’s Next Century Innovators Awards. The programme allows the voice of people living with HIV to be heard within a clinical context and for vulnerable women adversely affected by poverty, stigma and limited employment opportunities to become breadwinners for their families, role models for their communities and undertake crucial task-shifting roles in a clinical and community context. The programme is now active in 49 clinics in 16 countries, employing 197 Expert Patients and caring for 41 803 children on antiretroviral therapy. The initiative results in an expanded repertoire of clinic and community psychosocial services, better clinic flow and improved quality of life for families affected by HIV/AIDS.
The PATA Child-Friendly Clinic Initiative was recently launched to uplift paediatric HIV clinics across sub-Saharan Africa. The programme focuses on improving existing facilities to provide safe and friendly environments for children in HIV care. Thus far, PATA has supported the development of child-friendly spaces in three HIV clinics. These spaces now serve as environments where children may participate in activities to play, socialise, learn and build resilience. A context such as this helps to reduce the fear, anxiety and distress often associated with HIV clinic visits. In having positive associations with HIV clinics, children are more likely to adhere to their antiretroviral therapy regimen, and return to the clinic for scheduled appointments.
PATA’s advocacy portfolio utilises PATA’s unique position between clinics on the ground and policy-makers, and strives to make health system policies more inclusive, more collaborative and more responsive. PATA believes that healthcare workers have their own innovative solutions to bottlenecks and challenges, which are cost-effective, context-appropriate, sustainable and designed for low-resource setting.
In 2012, PATA launched a new research portfolio to help witness events on the ground and monitor and record bottlenecks, challenges and successes. With its partners, PATA is currently conducting research on paediatric palliative care in Southern Africa and Nigeria and adolescent adherence and sexual and reproductive health in South Africa.
PATA routinely disseminates information, guidelines and tools to create a PATA network community using the PATA website, monthly newsletter and social media platforms. PATA newsletters, disseminated to 1 821 frontline healthcare workers, partners and supporters each month. It is published in English and French and features stories and feedback from clinics within the PATA network – keeping clinics informed and encouraged in their practice. PATA’s Facebook and Twitter pages share paediatric HIV treatment team successes, up-to-date news and resources focusing on paediatric HIV and encourage a sense of community.
PATA has the unique opportunity to assist with scaling up locally-resourced paediatric HIV support and care within 24 sub-Saharan African countries. PATA hopes to decrease the incidence and spread of HIV within the community or country by increasing access to essential diagnosis, treatment and monitoring services. PATA endeavours to promote sustainable development by co-providing educational opportunities and co-creating projects in collaboration with frontline healthcare workers themselves, with the ultimate aim of facilitating improved and sustainable paediatric HIV care in Africa.
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