Targeting Children for Medical Assessments

Tapologo offers free health assessment clinics for the orphan and vulnerable children (OVC) living in the squatter villages. However, many children do not attend these clinics. It is Tapologo’s goal to have a medical assessment of every child in these communities so that they can better understand the health situation in every community and also so Tapologo can give ARVs to the HIV positive children.

It was our task to find out which children have not been medically assessed in Freedom Park and Boitekong. We started by finding out which children have been assessed. We asked each care worker to tell us which of their children had been assessed. Each care worker could tell us off the top of their head which of their children had attended the health assessment clinic. I was very impressed by this. Each care worker looks after about 15-25 children. They did not even have to look at any files. It showed to me how close their relationship with their children is. Once we had the names of all the children who have already been assessed, we compared it to the master list of OV children to find out who still needs to be assessed. Tapologo will use this information to target these children and encourage them to attend the next health assessment clinic.