Antiviral use among hepatitis B infected patients in a low resource setting in Africa: a case study of West Nile, Uganda.

Failure to access antiviral medications is a leading cause of hepatitis B (HBV)-associated morbidity and mortality in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Despite guideline availability, SSA is not on course to meet its elimination targets. We characterized factors associated with antiviral medication use and challenges to offering chronic care in a large Ugandan institution.

Feasibility and acceptability of integrating hepatitis B care into routine HIV services: a qualitative study among health care providers and patients in West Nile region, Uganda.

Background: Despite facing a dual burden of HBV and HIV, Africa lacks experience in offering integrated care for HIV and HBV. To contextualize individual and group-level feasibility and acceptability of an integrated HIV/HBV care model, we explored perspectives of health care providers and care recipients on feasibility and acceptability of integration.

Methods: In two regional hospitals of West Nile region, we performed a demonstration project to assess feasibility and acceptability of merging the care of HBV-monoinfected patients with existing HIV care system.

Integrating hepatitis B care and treatment with existing HIV services is possible: cost of integrated HIV and hepatitis B treatment in a low-resource setting: a cross-sectional hospital-based cost-minimisation assessment.

Background: Hepatitis B and HIV care share health system challenges in the implementation of primary prevention, screening, early linkage to care, monitoring of therapeutic success and long-term medication adherence.

Setting: Arua regional referral hospital (RRH) and Koboko district hospital (DH), the West Nile region of Uganda.

Design: A cross-sectional hospital-based cost minimisation study from the providers' perspective considers financial costs to measure the amount of money spent on resources used in the stand-alone and integrated pathways.

A training for health care workers to integrate hepatitis B care and treatment into routine HIV care in a high HBV burden, poorly resourced region of Uganda: the '2for1' project.

Introduction: The "2for1" project is a demonstration project to examine the feasibility and effectiveness of HBV care integrated into an HIV clinic and service. An initial phase in implementation of this project was the development of a specific training program. Our objective was to describe key features of this integrated training curriculum and evaluation of its impact in the initial cohort of health care workers (HCWs).