Contextualisation of Early and Enhanced Clinical Exposure Model through Development of Curricula for Advanced Practice Nursing and Midwifery.

Background: An Advanced Practice Nurse is a generalist or specialized nurse who has acquired thorough graduate education a minimum of a master's degree. The need for Advanced Practice Nurses is increasingly recognized globally. This paper describes the process, which was undertaken by School of Nursing Sciences, University of Zambia in reviewing and developing advanced practice nursing and midwifery curricula which will be implemented using the Early and Enhanced Clinical Exposure model (EECE). Materials and Methods: The curricula development/review process utilized a modified Taba's Model which followed a step-by-step approach including: 1) desk review, 2) diagnosis of needs (needs assessment), 3) stakeholder consultations, 4) content development, 5) validations and approval from which several lessons were learnt and recommendations made. Findings and recommendations from different stages were used as a basis for reviewing and developing advanced practice nursing and midwifery curricula. Results: Desk review needs assessment and stakeholder consultations identified both strengths and weaknesses in the existing curricula. Major strengths were duration and core courses which met the minimum requirement for postgraduate nursing and midwifery training. Major weaknesses/gaps included some content that was too basic for the master's level and the delayed exposure to practicum sites which limited the development of advanced practice skills. Others were inadequate competence for advanced practice, inadequate research methodology course, lack of content to foster development of personal soft skills and predominant use of traditional teaching methods. Stakeholders recommended implementing advanced, clinical and hands-on Masters of Nursing and Midwifery programmes which resulted in the review of four existing and development of five demand-driven curricula. Conclusion: The reviewed and developed curricula were strengthened to close the identified gaps. Both the reviewed and developed curricula have been implemented using the Early and Enhanced Clinical Exposure Model with a view to producing Advanced Practice Nurses and Midwives who are competent to meet diverse health care needs and contribute to improving patient outcomes.

Health status and socio-economic factors associated with health facility utilization in rural and urban areas in Zambia.

BACKGROUND: With regards to equity, the objective for health care systems is "equal access for equal needs". We examined associations of predisposing, enabling and need factors with health facility utilization in areas with high HIV prevalence and few people being aware of their HIV status. METHODS: The data is from a population-based survey among adults aged 15years or older conducted in 2003. The current study is based on a subset of this data of adults 15-49 years with a valid HIV test result. A modified Health behaviour model guided our analytical approach. We report unadjusted and adjusted odds ratios and their 95% confidence intervals from logistic regression analyses. RESULTS: Totals of 1042 males and 1547 females in urban areas, and 822 males and 1055 females in rural areas were included in the study. Overall, 53.1% of urban and 56.8% of rural respondents utilized health facilities past 12 months. In urban areas, significantly more females than males utilized health facilities (OR=1.4 (95% CI [1.1, 1.6]). Higher educational attainment (10+ years of schooling) was associated with utilization of health facilities in both urban (OR=1.7, 95% CI [1.3, 2.1]) and rural (OR=1.4, 95% CI [1.0, 2.0]) areas compared to respondents who attained up to 7 years of schooling. Respondents who self-rated their health status as very poor/ poor/fair were twice more likely to utilize health facilities compared to those who rated their health as good/excellent. Respondents who reported illnesses were about three times more likely to utilize health facilities compared to those who did not report the illnesses. In urban areas, respondents who had mental distress were 1.7 times more likely to utilize health facilities compare to those who had no mental distress. Compared to respondents who were HIV negative, respondents who were HIV positive were 1.3 times more likely to utilize health facilities. CONCLUSION: The health care needs were the factors most strongly associated with health care seeking. After accounting for need differentials, health care seeking differed modestly by urban and rural residence, was somewhat skewed towards women, and increased substantially with socioeconomic position.

Targeting condom distribution at high risk places increases condom utilization-evidence from an intervention study in Livingstone, Zambia.

BACKGROUND: The PLACE-method presumes that targeting HIV preventive activities at high risk places is effective in settings with major epidemics. Livingstone, Zambia, has a major HIV epidemic despite many preventive efforts in the city. A baseline survey conducted in 2005 in places where people meet new sexual partners found high partner turnover and unprotected sex to be common among guests. In addition, there were major gaps in on-site condom availability. This study aimed to assess the impact of a condom distribution and peer education intervention targeting places where people meet new sexual partners on condom use and sexual risk taking among people socializing there. METHODS: The 2005 baseline survey assessed the presence of HIV preventive activities and sexual risk taking in places where people meet new sexual partners in Livingstone. One township was selected for a non-randomised intervention study on condom distribution and peer education in high risk venues in 2009. The presence of HIV preventive activities in the venues during the intervention was monitored by an external person. The intervention was evaluated after one year with a follow-up survey in the intervention township and a comparison township. In addition, qualitative interviews and focus group discussions were conducted. RESULTS: Young people between 17-32 years of age were recruited as peer educators, and 40% were females. Out of 72 persons trained before the intervention, 38 quit, and another 11 had to be recruited. The percentage of venues where condoms were reported to always be available at least doubled in both townships, but was significantly higher in the intervention vs. the control venues in both surveys (84% vs. 33% in the follow-up). There was a reduction in reported sexual risk taking among guests socializing in the venues in both areas, but reporting of recent condom use increased more among people interviewed in the intervention (57% to 84%) than in the control community (55% to 68%). CONCLUSIONS: It is likely that the substantial increase in reported condom use in the intervention venues was partially due to the condom distribution and peer education intervention targeting these places. However, substantial changes were observed also in the comparison community over the five year period, and this indicates that major changes had occurred in overall risk taking among people socializing in venues where people meet new sexual partners in Livingstone. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01423357.