Youth Friendly Services will bring health care
EIGHT provincial health care facilities in the Klipfontein and Mitchells Plain areas will officially launch Adolescent Youth Friendly Services (AYFS) in the next three months.
The services form part of the Young Women and Girls project, in partnership with provincial Health Department and the Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation, to reduce TB, HIV and teenage pregnancy among young women and girls in the Cape Metropole.
According to the department, about 19% of pregnancies and antenatal bookings are from teenagers accessing the services in the Mitchells Plain, Nyanga, Gugulethu, Manenberg, Heideveld, Crossroads, Hanover Park and Athlone areas who tested positive for HIV between 2015 and 2016.
The facilities launching the AYFS are Heideveld Community Day Centre (CDC), Hanover Park Community Health Centre (CHC), Gugulethu CHC, Dr Abdurahman CDC, Crossroads CDC, Nyanga CDC, Inzame Zabantu CDC and Mitchells Plain CHC.
Lulu Mtwisha of the Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation and facilitator of the AYFS process said: “We have discovered in random interviews outside the day hospital environment that our young people do not want to wait long for health care services, and often shy away from a facility when coming for family planning when they see an adult family member, or when they have to deal with a staff member who does not understand their emotional and health care needs and challenges.”
To counter these negative feelings, each facility will grant the youth access to a dedicated service from 2pm to 4pm from Monday to Friday, where a special reception window will be allocated to them.
Services offered at these AYF clinics will be mental health care, where a mental health nurse and registered counsellor will be available to provide guidance; emergency contraception; family planning; rehabilitation services and support from a social worker on an appointment basis; HIV and Aids tests and counselling and the treatment of sexually transmitted diseases, among other services.
Dr Abdurahman and Heideveld CDCs recently launched their AYFS to the community.
Dr Abdurahman CDC facility manager Florence Burger said: “We established a youth committee consisting of young staff members and youth from our drainage area to ensure that the facility is held accountable in its continuous plight to provide youth friendly health care services.”
Dr Abdurahman CDC youth committee chairperson Seagan van Niekerk, 23, said: “We want more physical activities, health-related and sexual education and awareness programmes for our young people, as most of us do not receive sexual education at home.”