By DC Correspondent

Copyright deccanchronicle

Hyderabad:A team from the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) on Monday visited Gandhi Hospital to review the ongoing HIV/AIDS control programmes, assess patient care facilities and examine data and research practices.The team interacted with hospital staff and reviewed the availability of counsellors, psychologists and rehabilitation services for patients. They examined case statistics, which showed 4,563 total HIV cases, including 481 patients on second-line treatment, while third-line cases are also being closely monitored.Hospital superintendent Dr Vani said the team discussed key issues such as the orientation of staff, deployment patterns, referral turnaround time (TAT) and annual referral reviews. Officials also inspected the Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) centre, CC and OP registers and the white care room to verify patient card updates and data accuracy.Counsellors explained procedures for new case registration, Management Information System (MIS) entry, loss-to-follow-up (LFU) tracking and Index Testing. The NACO team also examined data entries related to Strengthening Overall Care for HIV patients, White Card column updates, and records concerning opioid substitution therapy (OST).The officials further sought details of published research papers, ongoing studies, and the availability of mental health professionals and rehabilitation facilities for patient welfare.