A review of ICT systems for HIV/AIDS and anti-retroviral treatment management in South Africa

Summary Telemedicine and e-health systems have been proposed as a support tool, to monitor and evaluate HIV/AIDS management strategies. The aim of the present study was to provide an overview of telemedicine and e-health systems for HIV/AIDS in South Africa as a basis for developing an e-health toolkit for anti-retroviral treatment (ART). An initial literature review and a subsequent interactive networking approach were chosen to identify telemedicine and e-health systems, projects and services for HIV/AIDS and ART facilities in low-resource settings and under-served areas. The literature review produced little useful information. In contrast, the face-to-face interviews and the focus group discussions provided useful information about projects and systems which had not been published. The meetings involved 1–5 people per session, about 30 people in total. The review showed that there were some plans for telemedicine and e-health implementation in South Africa. However, there was no all-inclusive ICT-based system in place for AIDS treatment there. With the exception of the major health information systems and electronic patient record systems, none of the telemedicine and e-health systems identified in the review were ready to be deployed across the country as a whole.