AFRICA PROJECT o.n.l.u.s.

 
Africa Project Italy

Africa Project Kenya NGO

Africa Project Kenya is a charitable non governmental organization based in Malindi district along Suli Suli road off Lamu road 200metres from the Kenya Red Cross Society offices in Malindi. It was founded in October 2007 as a brain child of Africaproject Italy and was initially registered as a community based organization (C.B.O). Africaproject Kenya was later upgraded into a charitable non governmental organization and registered with the non governmental organizations board in March 2010.
The organization was established to offer charity services to the less fortunate people within Malindi district, with a specific target group being the children infected and affected by HIV and Aids. This was because within the district there was no other registered organization specially designed to offer care and support to this specified group.
The core vision of Africaproject Kenya is to offer an equal opportunity for growth and development to a HIV infected and affected child. To achieve this vision the organizations is designed to offer:

A)Comprehensive medical care

 
B)Home based care services

In the attempt of the organization to achieve the above mentioned objectives, there are two other institutions registered and operating under the umbrella of Africaproject Kenya. These institutions are set to offer the different services that are focused towards the well being of each of our target group. They are managed from a common office led by the Chief Executive Officer who is also the administrator and the treasurer to the board of directors, and a board of seven directors. These institutions are

1)Benedicto XVI Health Center

2)Home Based Care Program

Benedicto XVI Health Centre is a registered health institution that offers comprehensive health care services to patients in a twenty four hour basis.
The health centre is headed by a well trained and qualified clinical officer who works with the assistance one other clinical officer, two nurses, a laboratory technologist, two counselors, four nurse aids, one receptionist and one accounts clerk. The hospital has got various departments that carry out different activities to ensure that we offer holistic health care services to our patients.

 
Consultation

 
This is the department whereby the patient is first seen by the clinician, a comprehensive patient history is taken that is the current complain, old existing medical problems both chronic and acute, family history to rule out conditions that run in families, drug reactions and allergies. From this the clinician is able to determine kind of treatment to give to the patient.

 
Emergency Room

 
This is the department whereby we receive patients who have had accidents, injuries and are bleeding and those that are very sick and require quick treatment to save life. In this department we ensure that we have all the emergency drugs, first aid kits and airways to help very sick patients with breathing problems.
Here we are also able to carry out minor surgical procedures like circumcision for boys, incision and drainage of abscesses and suturing of cuts.

Laboratory

 
Our laboratory is set to perform most of the daily analysis that is on specimen like urine, blood, stool, sputum. However we have the challenge of putting in more machines to do the analyses to a more advanced level especially as we are with HIV and HIV related conditions.
Tuberculosis clinic
We are currently a government appointed Tuberculosis testing site and therefore working in collaboration with the Ministry of Health through the Malindi District Hospital through this we have also become a Tuberculosis treatment site and this has increased our value as a HIV management site. Currently we run an average of …… TB tests in a month.

Observation room / ward 

This is the sleeping area whereby patients that require to be observed for a longer period by the clinician are admitted. Patients receiving parenteral medication are admitted here and are observed by a nurse who reports the patient’s progress to the clinician. The area is divided to create privacy for the men, women and children.

Ante Natal Care /Family Planning

This department offers care to pregnant women from conception until they are ready for delivery. Here we ensure that we take the full obstetric history of mothers so as to ensure that we minimize the chances complications in pregnancy and also at child birth. In this department we also do family planning counseling whereby we help couples to make informed decision on family spacing on the number of children they desire to have. We provide both natural and artificial methods of family planning as our hospital caters for the entire community that has various cultural and religious backgrounds, and also put into consideration the prevalence of HIV.

Voluntary Counseling and Testing For HIV 

Our hospital offers voluntary counseling and testing of HIV whereby we are a government approved testing site. We have well trained and qualified counselors who work hand in hand with the laboratory technologist to ensure that clients receive authentic results for the tests. This is a very important department as it is from here that we identify and assist clients who test HIV positive to live a normal life through the use of Ante retroviral therapy that involves the use of both medicine and counseling. Clients that test negative are counseled on how to remain negative by adapting healthy lifestyle whereas those that test positive are counseled on how to accept the status and follow up is done to ensure they are following instructions given. We are working hard towards becoming a government approved comprehensive counseling and care provider whereby we will be able to provide total support to our HIV positive clients to include viral load tests,CD4 counting and dispensing antiretroviral drugs

Pharmacy 

The hospital has a well stocked pharmacy whereby Africaproject ensures that they purchase all the drugs that patients do require. The pharmacy is managed by a nurse who dispenses drugs as per the clinician’s instructions. At the pharmacy we ensure that any drug allergies have been taken into consideration to prevent complications to the patients. We also ensure that the patients receive proper instructions on how to take the medicine dispensed.

The social department is headed by the social worker and carries out the home based care programe

HOMEBASED CARE PROGRAME

Home based care is an integrated, comprehensive, continuation of care for people infected with HIV as well as other disabling medical conditions and and/or terminal diseases. Africaproject Kenya as a charity organization extends its services from the hospital to the homes and the community level. The projects home based care program is designed to cater for the HIV infected people, OVC (orphan and vulnerable children) and the needy in the society. The project achieves this by sending out a team comprising of a social worker, a clinical officer and an assistant where there is real need. These services are offered to the community for free by the project in its attempt to help in bringing up a healthy society. 

People with HIV and other illnesses have multiple needs that can only be addressed through comprehensive care. Such care is continuous from the health facility to the home and community, and is not only restricted to treatment but also other supportive elements. The key elements of comprehensive care include clinical care, nursing care and palliative care. Other aspects are psycho-social support, counseling and HIV testing. Underlining these are family care and support of orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) and care of caregivers. Food and nutrition support and education as well as program monitoring and evaluation are also some of our key components

In our home based care package we do:

•  Care and support for HIV positive people with emphasizes on the children. Due to the social economic status of the people in the area we extend our services to the adults and the affected families. This includes, nursing and palliative care, clinical care that emphasize on treatment of opportunistic infections and sustainability of the care, family care and OVC support, capacity building and monitoring and evaluation. 
•  Ant-jiggers campaigns, that is management of people infested with jiggers and control of the pest within the homesteads.
•  Community education on issues of HIV, communicable diseases, trauma therapy on terminal illnesses, family planning and child care and nutrition.
•  Capacity building to the different groups of people with their characteristics and life skills training to children . 

• For the project to reach to the people and the children with these characteristics, There are various steps and procedures that are followed when offering assistance

  1.   Community mobilization: in community mobilization we move out into the villages to offer the information. This can be through face to face dialogue where you meet a person and convey the message about HIV and other health facts can be through organized community meetings and/or groups holding their meetings can be in schools and other social institutions and also can offer information in form of written posters. On offering information individual persons may get interested and/or want a particular service, hence will come for the service.

   

  1.  Contacting the client: to get to the client we have different methods that we use to get information. This is through:
  •  Survey and field studies: this is carried out in the field during community mobilization. This is where we take our car move into the interior of the community. Here we meet people at individual levels; we organize for group meetings or join in already established groups. On meeting we introduce our selves and offer them with information about where we are located, what we do and the importance the activities and the services we offer. In  case of any questions we clarify all the issues to them. From this any person who has the knowledge of such a case or is affected brings up the case to the organization and the process for support commences.

  We also do case studies we take our car and go to an area that we have not visited before; we carry out interview and do a lot of observations to find information on some of the key areas of interest. After collecting the necessary information, we do an analysis that enables us to understand some of the challenges present in respect to our area of interest. From this we make recommendations that lead us to a plan of action on how to offer support. This is one of the main methods we use to get to our clients

  •  Self applicants: this is when we get people coming into our institution in search of assistance by themselves. They may have heard information about the existence of the project from other sources or as a trial. When they come in we welcome them and hold a close dialogue with them. Through this we are able to identify the problem that they have and device a plan of action/assistance. We also take direction and details of where they live for easy access when conducting visits. Incase it is an issue that does not fall within our area of policy, we refer or help them to find the adequate institution that can offer the assistance, we ensure that the person has been assisted adequately. Incase the problem lies within our area of interest we commence the procedure of assistance. 
  • •  Networking and referrals: this is our third method of contact with the clients. Africaproject as a charity organization cannot meet all the client needs by itself, we link with the government and other non-governmental organizations within the area for different purpose. These organizations know about our project and its activities, therefore when they get clients with the characteristics of the needs that we support they send them to us as referrals. When they came to us we do case studies identify the problem and commence support. We also refer clients to other organizations for specialized care and support when the level of the problem is more advanced for our capacity.

    III Needs assessment:  needs assessment is through process through which we skillfully and carefully do a thorough case analysis to bring out the underlying cause of the problem and challenge that the client/ patient is going through regardless the cause of treatment that has been administered. This leads to the nature of assistance that the client will be given in order to facilitate the recovery process. The needs may be psychological or material depending with the assessment.

                        IV Social support: this is the support system established by the organization to cater/ solve the client’s needs depending with the identified characteristic of the problem. This is guide towards the problem solving process. This may call for material support and or psychological support (counseling). In our problem solving process we start with the most pressing problem and the easiest to manage going down to that which will call for a longer period of treatment.

    In social support we also offer education support to the infected and affected children. This is where Africaproject buys all the school requirements and makes payment for school fees. Currently we have 24 children who are under our education support.

    Nutrition support is also a method of support that we offer to our clients. This is determined by the doctors in our health centre. Once this need has been identified the projects buys the required nutritional supplements for the clients. 

    All the methods overlap and work together towards solving a client’s problem. One or two approaches may be applied towards a lasting solution.

    The project through the home based care department does capacity building to clients and care givers. This is to offer a lasting solution to social-economic problems. This is where we take the clients through simple business plans and ventures. This helps the client to identify simple business that they can start and manage and in return they get some income. These businesses are facilitated by Africaproject through offering the starting capital and mentainance for a few months then the client is left to proceed. We also facilitate women groups that we form from the caregivers to the OVC. We offer capital to start simple income generating project for the sustenance of the children they take care.

    The OVCs that we focused on are those whose parents are deceased as a result of HIV virus and or any other cause, leaving behind orphaned children who are dependent. These children are vulnerable to all forms of exploitation from within the immediate family members or from other people. The other category is those infected with HIV virus. These children in our society are faced with a lot of challenges by virtue of their status, stigma and neglect from the other people and their value for life has been denied. As a result of this the rights of the children and their needs are not addressed hence a negative impact on the growth and development of the children towards responsible adulthood.

    Africaproject- Kenya as a charity organization has been established to offer support to the OVCs through offering adequate medical care, education services, psycho- social support and material support. This is achieved by the efforts of the project through the fieldwork team, medical team and those in the nursery school department. The major role played by the social work department is to operate in the community to identify and do day to day follow ups of clients.

    Ant-jiggers campaigns, that is management of people infested with jiggers and control of the pest within the homesteads. This service is provided to the community as free service by the organization as part of its contribution to the welfare of the society. The infestation of the pests to the persons infected with HIV is a threat to their immune development. In this regard we have to put more emphasis in controlling the pest. The program is carried out within the hospital when we notice clients/patients visiting the hospital with the problem and in the community during the community mobilization.

     Community education on: HIV and Aids, communicable diseases, trauma therapy on terminal illnesses, family planning and child care and nutrition. In this package we make sessions for health talks and demonstrations. The health team and the outreach design the topics to give depending with the current situations.