Understanding the context of private general practitioners’ prescribing practices and patient management decisions in South Africa

There is little research on the quality of care in the private sector, despite acknowledgment that a sizeable segment of the population (including those with TB-related symptoms) in high HIV and HIV/TB burden contexts make use of this sector. There is, furthermore, growing attention lately to how the private healthcare sector could be contributing to the 2.9 million people with TB who do not get diagnosed and subsequently get notified to official TB programmes. The project aimed to describe the quality of TB and HIV care among private general practitioners (GPs) in South Africa. Within a multi-technique study design woven around use of ‘Standardised patients’ – actors trained to systematically present a complaint or set of symptoms in real clinical settings – a qualitative sub-component sought insights into meanings and contexts surrounding private GPs’ management decisions. Team members included Amrita Daftary, York University; Sizulu Moyo, Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC); Madhukar Pai, McGill University; Jody Boffa, York University, and University of KwaZulu-Natal, and Jeremiah Chikovore, HSRC.