Research and Training Programs

Building on the success of a pilot program training traditional healers to initiate HIV counseling and testing, the Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health and the University of Witwatersrand have partnered to expand healer-initiated HIV testing and linkage to care in South Africa.The study team will conduct a cluster, randomized, controlled trial comparing healer-initiated HIV counseling and testing to the standard of care in rural South Africa by utilizing an existing and trusted resource — traditional healers.

Under the program, Molemolemo: Building Research Administration Excellence in South Africa, grant administrators from the Vanderbilt Institute for Global facilitate advanced research capacity through training and implementation of a structured grants management course with administrative leaders from Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC). A significant focus and output of the collaboration with Aurum is the in-house development of a structured grants management training course for non-US-based organizations, which includes essential and elective modules. 

Principal Investigator(s):  Kate Clouse, Ph.D., M.P.H.

Traditional healers, community-based partners with the national health system of South Africa, are exposed to patient blood an average of 1,500 times during their careers due to the practice of delivering herbal remedies via herbs rubbed into dozens of sub-cutaneous cuts. The purpose of this proposal is to compare two implementation strategies to increase consistent use of PPE: (1) a health care worker provided training program followed by 3 educational outreach and coaching visits at the healer's place of practice vs.

South Africa has more HIV/AIDS patients than any other country and is home to the world’s largest antiretroviral program. According to the World Bank, as of 2018 the prevalence of HIV among South Africans ages 15 to 49 was 20.4%. Nearly one in three pregnant women attending antenatal care in South Africa is living with HIV. As South Africans with HIV move around the country, there is a risk they will disengage from the health care system or otherwise become lost to follow-up care.

In South Africa, HIV testing has been undermined by HIV stigma, distrust in the allopathic health system, a preference for traditional medicine, and distance to the health facility. South Africa has made progress towards their 90-90-90 goals, yet a substantial proportion of the population do not test regularly; only 33.9% of adults in rural Mpumalanga (our study site) underwent HIV testing in the past year.

Project Details: NIH Reporter