Musonda RM; International Conference on AIDS.
Int Conf AIDS. 1994 Aug 7-12; 10: 236 (abstract no. PB0959).
Tropical Diseases Research Centre, Ndola.
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the capability of government and mission hospital laboratories in the Northern region of Zambia. METHODS: A survey of 31 HIV screening hospital laboratories (labs) was undertaken in 4 provinces in Northern region of Zambia including the Copperbelt. Physical inspection, personal interview were carried out and questionnaire was administered to assess their capabilities which included, personnel, diagnostic methods, basic equipment, supplies and HIV test kits. FINDINGS: All the 31 hospitals visited carry HIV antibody screening of blood donors and have at least one trained lab personnel. However, the overall standards of labs were found to be poor except in some mission hospitals. Most of the labs are dilapidated while others have no proper infrastructure to handle infectious specimens or blood banks. None of the labs had a safety biological cabinet. In addition, the equipment is obsolete, with poor performance, compounded by lack of standard testing procedures, basic reagents for routine diagnostics and quality control. The majority of hospital labs uses manual and crude diagnostic methods for blood grouping, clinical chemistry, haematology with no facilities for diagnosis of microorganisms. Quality assurance procedures are none existence. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: The laboratory services for patients care has always been given very little attention by health ministries of most countries in Africa and Zambia in particular. This has been partly due to economic problems and lack of expertise in the area of laboratory science. The increase in demand for diagnoses of Mycobacteria tuberculosis, Sexually transmitted diseases and other opportunistic infections in patients with AIDS/ARC has made it a matter of high priority for the hospital labs to establish proper facilities for diagnostic including drug sensitivity studies for improvement of patient care and control of the spread of infectious diseases in the community. There is a need for Biotechnology companies to invest in development of cheaper, simple and reliable, basic clinical laboratory techniques for countries in Africa.
Publication Types:
Keywords:
- AIDS-Related Complex
- Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
- Africa
- Africa South of the Sahara
- Blood Banks
- Blood Donors
- HIV Antibodies
- HIV Infections
- Health
- Health Personnel
- Hospitals
- Humans
- Laboratories
- Laboratories, Hospital
- Laboratory Techniques and Procedures
- Mass Screening
- Quality Control
- Zambia
Other ID:
UI: 102210429
From Meeting Abstracts