National Health Facility Audit (Baseline Audit)

This one-year project aims to conduct an audit of public health facilities (including clinics, community health centres and district, regional, specialised and tertiary hospitals) in all nine provinces using existing, standardised measurement tools and capturing the collected data into the DHIS Core Standards for Health Establishments database.

The audit’s areas of assessment include:

• the range of health services provided by a public health facility
• the self-reported profile of each facility – including its location, catchment population, referral network, accessibility for patients, utilities available, and physical infrastructure and size – all to be verified on-site by an Audit Team
• the state of the physical infrastructure in terms of condition, safety and compliance with building regulations
• the availability and basic functionality of medical equipment and backups, including an age analysis of items requiring replacement
• the degree of compliance with national quality standards in the following priority areas: the values and attitude of staff; the cleanliness of facilities; patient waiting times; patient safety and security; infection prevention and control; and the availability of critical medicines and supplies (otherwise known as the six priority areas)
• the allocation and availability of human resources in the various categories of occupation and skills breakdown in the facility
• the status and utilisation of Health Information Systems (as applicable to regional, specialized and tertiary hospitals)
• the general utilisation rates of healthcare services and facilities (in order to develop norms and standards)
• the budget and expenditure reports for the health facilities

BASELINE AUDIT PROGRESS

The Baseline Audit project commenced in the Northern Cape Province on 3 May 2011 and the Western Cape was the last province to commence the audit on 20 July. There are 20 teams across all nine provinces that are supporting the implementation of the audit. These teams comprise members from HST and its Partners as well as designated provincial and district staff that have been trained on the National Core Standards process.

In total 4210 public health facilities are being audited nationally. The table below provides a breakdown of the number of facilities, per type, across the provinces.

Public Health Facilities

As at the end of July 2011, 21% of facilities were audited nationally. The progress and status of the audit as at the end of July 2011 in each of the provinces is presented in the table below. The estimated completion date of the Baseline Audit is May 2012.

Audit completion as at July 2011

Estimated completion rate

PROJECT TEAM MEMBERS:

Ronel Visser

Project Director:

René English

Rakshika Bhana

Project Managers

Nandy Mothibe (HST)
Theo Rencken (Exponant)
Mannini Makoa (Arup)

20 Audit teams:

Each team comprising a Team Co-ordinator, an Infrastructure Assessor and a Data Capturer

Candy Day
TA from Partners