Operational assessment of point-of-care diagnostics in rural primary healthcare clinics of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa: a cross-sectional survey

BMC Health Services Research
Tivani P Mashamba-ThompsonPaul Drain

Abstract

The World Health Organization (WHO) called for new clinical diagnostic for settings with limited access to laboratory services. Access to diagnostic testing may not be uniform in rural settings, which may result in poor access to essential healthcare services. The aim of this study is to determine the availability, current usage, and need for point-of-care (POC) diagnostic tests among rural primary healthcare (PHC) clinics in South Africa's KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) province. We used the KZN's Department of Health (DoH) clinic classification to identify the 232 rural PHC clinics in KZN, South Africa. We then randomly sampled 100 of 232 rural PHC clinics. Selected health clinics were surveyed between April to August 2015 to obtain clinic-level data for health-worker volume and to determine the accessibility, availability, usage and need for POC tests. Professional healthcare workers responsible for POC testing at each clinic were interviewed to assess the awareness of POC testing. Data were survey weighted and analysed using Stata 13. Among 100 rural clinics, the average number of patients seen per week was 2865 ± 2231 (range 374-11,731). The average number of POC tests available and in use was 6.3 (CI: 6.2-6.5) out of a potential of ...Continue Reading

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Sep 8, 2017·African Journal of Laboratory Medicine·Tivani P Mashamba-ThompsonPaul K Drain

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Citations

Jul 26, 2019·BMC Health Services Research·Desmond KuupielTivani P Mashamba-Thompson
May 17, 2019·Clinical Microbiology Reviews·Paul K DrainNigel Garrett
Jun 13, 2019·BMC Public Health·Elizabeth SpoonerAnna Coutsoudis
Oct 20, 2020·Open Forum Infectious Diseases·Eneyi E KpokiriJoseph D Tucker
Aug 9, 2020·The Lancet. HIV·Nitika Pant PaiTrevor Peter

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