Publications by authors named "Sharon Lwezaula"

Community health worker (CHW)-led community delivery of HIV antiretroviral therapy (ART) could increase ART coverage and decongest healthcare facilities. It is unknown how much patients would be willing to pay to receive ART at home and, thus, whether ART community delivery could be self-financing. Set in Dar es Salaam, this study aimed to determine patients' willingness to pay (WTP) for CHW-led ART community delivery.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: With the increase in people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa and expanding eligibility criteria for antiretroviral therapy (ART), there is intense interest in the use of novel delivery models that allow understaffed health systems to successfully deal with an increasing demand for antiretroviral drugs (ARVs). This pragmatic randomized controlled trial in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, evaluated a novel model of ARV community delivery: lay health workers (home-based carers [HBCs]) deliver ARVs to the homes of patients who are clinically stable on ART, while nurses and physicians deliver standard facility-based care for patients who are clinically unstable. Specifically, the trial aimed to assess whether the ARV community delivery model performed at least equally well in averting virological failure as the standard of care (facility-based care for all ART patients).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Home delivery of antiretroviral therapy (ART) by community health workers (CHWs) may improve ART retention by reducing the time burden and out-of-pocket expenditures to regularly attend an ART clinic. In addition, ART home delivery may shorten waiting times and improve quality of care for those in facility-based care by decongesting ART clinics. This trial aims to determine whether ART home delivery for patients who are clinically stable on ART combined with facility-based care for those who are not stable on ART is non-inferior to the standard of care (facility-based care for all ART patients) in achieving and maintaining virological suppression.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF