UNICEF Consultancy - Assess and Design Jobs in Kenya

UNICEF Consultancy - Assess and Design Jobs in Kenya

Laboratory diagnostic services are essential to guide patient care and treatment for a variety of health conditions.

The National HIV Reference Laboratory (NHRL) of the Ministry of Health (MoH) together with the support from UNICEF and CHAI laboratory Point of care (POC) partners are implementing a program to support Viral Load ( VL) and Early Infant Diagnosis (EID) Point-Nucleic acid testing techniques , thereby creating the opportunity to strengthen specimen referral networks and support for a robust laboratory Monitoring & Evaluation (M & E) framework at the county level to support multi-disease testing among other areas.

This would enable NHRL POC implementing team to build on certain programmatic strengths (i.e. the various mechanisms through HIV partners mainly funded by the United States Government USG) and better coordinate and manage its VL & EID specimen referral systems into one comprehensive and integrated network.

In Kenya, diagnostic services can be provided in a tiered framework that ranges from the national centralized laboratory to remote health facilities that have limited resources.

A well implemented centralized laboratory has the potential to achieve high throughput testing with multi-purpose platforms, often at low cost.

To date, the function of existing laboratory services in the country remains suboptimal due to multiple factors including low instrument utilization rates, inadequate data management, supply chain issues, human resource challenges, low rates of results returned, poor quality systems, suboptimal sample transportation systems and low-quality specimens.

Point-of-care testing (POCT) is medical diagnostic testing at or near the point of care—that is, at the time and place of patient care.

The MOH through NHRL and NASCOP has been working with UNICEF, EGPAF, CHAI, MSF, GHI, PLHIV networks and other key partners to introduce POCT for Early Infant Diagnosis (EID) for HIV testing with simplicity through innovative technology adaptation and placemen.

As at June 2018, two platforms/machines are approved and validated for use in Kenya; Alere Q and GeneXpert and implemented in over 20 counties supporting over 700 facilities as a pilot.

Additionally, through gene Xpert, viral testing for specific populations is currently being piloted in select counties.

This consultancy will support the initial assessment of POC sample and waste management implementation in Kenya.

It will inform the future design and implementation phases of Point-Of-Care Viral Load and EID testing through inclusion of the findings in a documented, costed and publicly-available plan, within the country that reflects unique needs and circumstances of each county engaged and ultimately guide county specific VL/EID transition plans.

The expected product will be a report on the county laboratory capacity in relation to multi-disease test integration in support for HIV Early Infant Diagnosis, Viral Load and Tuberculosis testing; a county baseline M & E framework report and a county capacity assessment to support Point-Of-Care waste management.

Scope of Work