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Project HelpCenter

Project HelpCenter. Tom Platteau Institute of Tropical Medicine Antwerp. History of HelpCenter. Until 2005: partner of CAW Metropool Psycho-social and medical aid for sexual and reproductive health issues. From 2006 on: partner of ITM to improve access to HIV-test

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Project HelpCenter

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  1. Project HelpCenter Tom Platteau Institute of Tropical Medicine Antwerp

  2. History of HelpCenter • Until 2005: partner of CAW Metropool • Psycho-social and medical aid for sexual and reproductive health issues. • From 2006 on: partner of ITM to improve access to HIV-test • Free of charge consultation and HIV-test • External service, not located at ITM • Priority changes towards: • Accent on HIV-test (and STI-tests), • Reaching specific target groups (MSM, SAM) • No long-term follow-up.

  3. Main goal: Secondary HIV-prevention • Increase the number of people living with HIV (PLWH) • Who are aware of their HIV-serostatus • With access to • Health care • Preventive care • Who adopt and maintain preventive behavior for HIV and sexually transmittable infections (STI) • Improve preventive behavior among HIV-negative people with high risk behavior.

  4. Secondary goals • Generate recommendations • On a policy level • For political decision makers • On a sociological level • For specific (sub-)cultures • On an organizational level • For a standard of care for health care providers.

  5. Staff of HelpCenter • Receptionist • Social nurse • Medical doctors • Sexologist • Coordinator

  6. Method Low threshold consultations for sexual health care: • HIV- and STI-tests (anonymously on demand); • Consultations for complaints and questions on STI, pregnancy, contraception, safe sex, … • Psychological and sexological advice and treatment; • Confidential counseling on sexual problems; • An approach that takes intercultural aspects into account, as well as the socially weak position of women, young people and migrants.

  7. Target Groups • Migrants from Africa, Asia, Central and South-America, Eastern- and Central Europe… • People with a difficult access to regular health care (young people, difficult relationship with GP) • People with high-risk sexual behavior • People who are seeking an anonymous HIV- or STI-test

  8. Activities • Medical consultations • Sexological consultations • Operational research (to generate policy guidelines) • Specific projects: • Rapid HIV-test since June 2007 • Outreach testing in preparation phase

  9. Co-operation • HIV-SAM: • “Muungano” in HelpCenter (patient-group for African migrants living with HIV) • Attendance of an African doctor to provide culturally sensitive counseling at HelpCenter • Sensoa: • Publicity towards MSM • Others: • De Acht, AZG, CLB,…

  10. Results January - June 07 • Medical consultations: • 274 patients • 159 patients had HIV-test (58%) • 532 patient contacts • Mean: 20,5 consultations per week

  11. HIV-test January – June 07 • 159 patients had HIV-test • 88 males, 71 females • 1 test HIV-positive • 38 (23,9%) had an anonymous test • 121 (76,1%) not anonymous

  12. HelpCenter patientsHealth Insurance (N=266)

  13. HelpCenter patients Origin(N=274)

  14. African patients • Total of African patients: 45 • Sex of African patients: • 14 male • 31 female • 25 African patients had HIV-test (11 male, 14 female) • Anonymous vs not anonymous: 2/25 (8%) vs 23/25 (92%) • Percentage anonymous among African patients (8%) < overall percentage (23,9%)

  15. African patientsReasons for consulting HelpCenter

  16. African patientsReason for having an HIV-test

  17. Conclusions • HelpCenter reaches its socially vulnerable target group: 40% has no health insurance • Anonymous testing is, in contrary as expected, more requested by people with health insurance (socially less vulnerable). Therefore, fixed sum (€20) for anonymous STI check-up is requested. • Additional efforts to reach target groups in order to increase number of tests are necessary.

  18. Acknowledgements • Kristien Wouters • Christiana Nöstlinger • Filip Moerman • Chris Van Ghyseghem • Ilse Collier

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