Hope for children and families
Background and Scope of Work for Morehead-Cain Scholar 2013 Placement
with Keep a Child Alive and Alive Medical Services in Kampala, Uganda
Background on Keep a Child Alive
Our Mission
Keep a Child Alive believes that every person has the right to health care and deserves a future. We
support innovative, community-led responses that increase access to life-saving, and life-changing, HIV
care and treatment, nutritious food, and loving support for children and families living with and affected
by HIV in Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa, Uganda, and India. With Alicia Keys as Global Ambassador, Keep
a Child Alive uses its voice to raise awareness, mobilize people to take action, and rally resources in the
global response to HIV.
Our Beginnings
Keep a Child Alive (KCA) was founded in 2003 by long-time AIDS activist Leigh Blake and co-founded by
12-time Grammy Award winner Alicia Keys. KCA began as an emergency response to the HIV epidemic,
raising global awareness about the urgent and unmet need for HIV treatment for children in subSaharan Africa, and granting funds to community-based organizations to provide free, life-saving
treatment to keep people living with HIV from needlessly dying. Ten years later, our core mission is
unchanged and our work has expanded and grown to include the care components that support
successful HIV treatment: comprehensive clinical care, psychosocial support, and food and nutritional
support.
Our founder’s passion and commitment continue today through the work of 7 KCA-supported grassroots
organizations in 5 countries: Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa, Uganda, and India. Over the past decade, KCA
and its partners have directly impacted the lives of over 300,000 people and currently support over
9,000 children and adults on HIV treatment.
Raising our Voices for Increased Access to HIV Care and Treatment
HIV treatment, or antiretroviral therapy (ART), has transformed the lives of people living with HIV,
returning them from sickness to health, ensuring that an HIV diagnosis is no longer considered a death
sentence but rather a chronic disease to be managed, and helping to prevent new HIV infections.
Despite increased access to treatment worldwide, 46% of adults who need HIV treatment still can’t get
it. Among children, access to HIV treatment remains shockingly low - only 28% of children living with
HIV who need treatment are on it. We are committed to continue the fight to ensure access to HIV
treatment and care for each and every child and adult in need.
The statistics are devastating: More than 230,000 children died unnecessarily from AIDS-related causes
in 2011, and 330,000 were unnecessarily infected with HIV because their mothers lacked access to
information and treatment to prevent transmission of the virus to their babies. Every day, 2,500 young
people between ages 10-24 are newly infected with HIV. Worldwide, 16.6 million children have lost their
parents to AIDS, 15 million of whom live in sub-Saharan Africa (UNAIDS 2012).
45 Main Street, Suite 617, Brooklyn, NY 11201 phone. 718-965-1111 fax. 718-965-1158
www.keepachildalive.org
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Hope for children and families
Our Focus Areas
Keep a Child Alive is committed to upholding the human right to health care by delivering
compassionate, quality care that provides our clients dignity and a chance to live healthy, productive
lives. To fulfill this commitment, KCA programs prioritize increasing access to:
1. Comprehensive HIV Care and Treatment Services: KCA’s local partners provide free,
comprehensive and compassionate HIV care, treatment, and support services. Our integrated
approach to HIV care provides children, young people, women, and men with the services and
support they need to stay well, keep their families healthy, and prevent new HIV infections.
2. Nutritional Support: Knowing that poverty and lack of food and safe drinking water are major
challenges for the clients and families we serve, KCA programs provide food and access to safe
water as part of comprehensive HIV care. Having enough nutritious food to eat and access to clean
water helps retain clients in care and improve adherence, prevents illnesses, strengthens the
immune system, and can enhance the effect of HIV treatment.
3. Care for Orphans and Vulnerable Children: Many of KCA’s community-based partners help ensure
that the comprehensive needs of children orphaned by AIDS or who are otherwise vulnerable are
met, including critically important psychosocial support services, education, and health care. We
strengthen community and family support systems so that orphaned and vulnerable children can
stay in their communities, where they often have the best chance of attaining a healthy future.
4. Support for a Future: KCA’s commitment to the individuals, families, and communities we serve
goes beyond medical care. We integrate social welfare assistance and legal support for the most
vulnerable children, young people, and adults, income generating activities, skills building, and
vocational training.
For more information on Keep a Child Alive, please visit our website: http://keepachildalive.org/
And follow us on social media:
http://www.facebook.com/keepachildalive
http://www.twitter.com/keepachildalive
45 Main Street, Suite 617, Brooklyn, NY 11201 phone. 718-965-1111 fax. 718-965-1158
www.keepachildalive.org
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Hope for children and families
Background on Alive Medical Services
Nearly a Decade of Inspiration and Growth
Keep a Child Alive began supporting Alive Medical Services (AMS) in 2004. At this time, Dr. Pasquine
Ogunsanya and her husband, Dr. Adebiyi Ogunsanya, were operating a small clinic in response to the
dire need for dignified HIV-related health services and support that they saw in their community. What
started as a small, one-room clinic has since grown and expanded in ways that we never dreamed of,
thanks to Drs. Pasquine and Adebiyi’s tireless dedication, service, and commitment to health care as a
human right.
Now, in 2013, AMS, with support from KCA, provides comprehensive HIV treatment, care, and loving
support to more than 10,500 people living with HIV, including 5,000 people on life-saving and lifechanging ART and 1,000 children. AMS provides services to approximately 130 new clients every month
and, despite limited clinic space and staffing, sees on average 4,000 clients per month. AMS operates 24
hours per day, 7 days each week in Namuwongo, a large, poor, and underserved informal settlement in
Kampala, Uganda. Namuwongo is situated near a railroad track and its residents have very limited
access to clean water and sanitation. AMS offers a variety of services to the residents of Namuwongo
including:
 High quality in-patient and out-patient services for adults and children
 Comprehensive HIV treatment and care
 Treatment and prevention of opportunistic infections
 Nutritional support, including food distribution
 Safe water education and PUR demonstration and distribution (supported by Proctor and
Gambles safe water program)
 Psychosocial support, including individual counseling and support groups
 Antenatal care and maternity services, including prevention of mother-to-child transmission
(PMTCT)
 Family planning
 Childhood immunizations and well-baby visits
 Laboratory services
 Voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) for HIV
 Youth-friendly HIV and related services
 Community outreach and education, home-based care, and follow-up
 Mobile clinics
 Ambulance transportation
In addition, AMS acts as a service site for medical students from Makerere University College of Health
Sciences, a training internship site for students studying HIV counseling, and an attachment site for nonmedical students from the Uganda Christian University, as well as Makerere University’s faculty of social
sciences.
The Nutrition and PUR Safe Drinking Water Program at Alive Medical Services
45 Main Street, Suite 617, Brooklyn, NY 11201 phone. 718-965-1111 fax. 718-965-1158
www.keepachildalive.org
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Hope for children and families
KCA and AMS believe that in order to provide truly comprehensive HIV care and support that we must
address the overall socio-economic status and wellbeing of the clients we serve and their family
members. As many of AMS’ clients live at or below the poverty line, lack access to safe water supplies,
and struggle with food insecurity, the provision of nutritious food and safe water are an integral part of
the model of comprehensive HIV care.
AMS organizes two nutrition days each month, where food parcels are distributed to more than 600
clients (benefitting as many as 1,400 clients and their extended families each month). This time is also
used to educate clients about the importance of good nutrition and safe water and to demonstrate and
distribute PUR packets and supplies (clean buckets, filter cloths, stirring sticks). As of December 2012,
AMS provided safe water education and PUR supplies to 5,500 clients each month. Each of these 5,500
clients has, on average, eight to nine family members in their homes. Therefore, the benefits of PUR
have been extended to an estimated 45,000 people in the community. Hundreds of clients arrive as
early as possible on nutrition days to collect their parcels and PUR supplies. An added benefit is that
many clients network and support one another when they come together during the nutrition days. This
informal peer support helps clients feel accepted and supported, reduces stigma, and contributes to a
sense of dignity.
While we know that offering “wrap around” services, such as nutritional support and safe water
education and supplies, benefit AMS clients and their family members, KCA and AMS would like to more
systematically document the AMS comprehensive model of HIV care and assess and document the
specific ways that nutrition and safe water services and support contribute to and impact, for example:
 Disease prevention (such as prevention of diarrhea and other water-borne illnesses among
clients and their family members)
 Retention in HIV care and treatment
 Adherence to medications, including ART
 Economic and social development of beneficiaries and their family members
 School enrollment and attendance among children (child clients or children of AMS clients)
For more information on AMS, including a video narrated by one of our clients, please visit:
http://keepachildalive.org/our-work/alive-medical-services/
Morehead-Cain Scholar Draft Scope of Work
Keep a Child Alive and Alive Medical Services are seeking a dynamic Morehead-Cain Scholar to spend 810 weeks during the summer of 2013. The scholar will work directly with Alive Medical Services staff,
volunteers, local student fellows, and beneficiaries in Kampala. The placement will offer a hands-on
experience working directly with a community-based HIV treatment, care, and support program, serving
some of the most vulnerable children, adults, and families living with and affected by HIV. Specifically,
we would like the Scholar to assess and document AMS’ nutrition and safe water programs, the
potential benefits to clients and families of offering these “wrap around” services as a part of
comprehensive, clinic-based HIV treatment and care, and any implementation challenges and solutions.
45 Main Street, Suite 617, Brooklyn, NY 11201 phone. 718-965-1111 fax. 718-965-1158
www.keepachildalive.org
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Hope for children and families
Depending on the skills and areas of interest of the Scholar, placement tasks may include the
following (to be agreed upon with Morehead-Cain Scholar, KCA, and AMS in advance):
 Work with AMS staff (counselors, nurses, community health workers, etc.) to prepare for
nutrition and safe water education and distribution sessions; observe sessions (which are usually
conducted in the local language).
 Participate in AMS nutrition and safe water days, including assisting with food and PUR
distribution and tracking.
 Working together with a Ugandan university student intern/fellow and AMS staff, assess and
document Alive Medical Service’s nutrition and safe water drinking programs.
o Assist in the development of data collection tools and the collection and reporting of key
information/data for the AMS nutrition and safe water programs (e.g. number of clients
benefitting, number of food parcels distributed, number of PUR packets and supplies
distributed, etc.)
o Conduct focus group discussions and in-depth interviews with clients benefitting from AMS’
nutrition and safe water programs to gain insight into the impact these programs are having
on clients and their families, challenges, and successes (including developing qualitative data
collection tools, conducting focus groups and interviews, analyzing findings, and writing up
results).
o Conduct a small household survey in the AMS catchment area, sampling 100 female-headed
households, to ask about, document, and analyze food security, as well as their water
collection, storage, and treatment practices (selecting, adapting, and reporting on indicators
from the WHO Monitoring and Evaluation Guidelines for Household Water Treatment).
o Work with the AMS quality improvement team to review and analyze a sample of AMS
client records to assess to impact of nutrition and safe water services on clients retention in
care, adherence to medicines, and health outcomes (e.g. incidence of diarrheal disease and
infections, weight gain, CD4 counts).
 Develop low-literacy nutrition and safe water take-away materials for clients and community
members.
 Provide general programmatic and documentation support to AMS, as needed.
On-site, day-to-day supervisor in Kampala:
Dr. Pasquine Ogunsanya, Director, Alive Medical Services
Keep a Child Alive supervisors in New York:
Tayla Colton, Sr. Director of Programs
Alana Hairston, Sr. Program Officer
45 Main Street, Suite 617, Brooklyn, NY 11201 phone. 718-965-1111 fax. 718-965-1158
www.keepachildalive.org
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