List of all referral hospitals in area of interest and accurate inventory systems to track how many HIV rapid tests are in stock as compared to how many are in demand in a given time frame (e.g. one month)

Data Source(s):

Referral hospitals

Purpose:

Safe blood transfusion is essential to prevent the transmission of transfusion-transmissible infections like HIV but also hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and syphilis. If HIV-contaminated blood is transfused, transmission of HIV to the recipient is almost 100%.  Establishing and maintaining a sufficient supply of HIV rapid tests at referral-level hospitals is critical for reducing the transmission of HIV from the onset of a humanitarian response.

Issue(s):

The validity of this indicator will be compromised when health facilities have poor inventory control.  Also, one HIV screening test is insufficient to determine HIV status.  Thus, if staff are inadequately trained or are not following national protocols for screening of blood, they may determine they have a sufficient number of HIV rapid tests when in actuality they have too few.

References:

Inter-agency Working Group on Reproductive Health in Crises. 2010. Inter-agency Field Manual on Reproductive Health in Humanitarian Settings: 2010 Revision for Field Review.