FAQ's

Answer: Management and Resources for Community Health, a Haitian foundation,
founded by Dr. Antoine Augustin.

2. What is DOT?

Answer: DOT stands for Directly Observed Therapy, an approach that has been used in
many countries in managing Tuberculosis. Now we are doing it for AIDS. The
point is to assist a sick person on a daily basis to remember to swallow the
pills, but also to help address the obstacles to care that they may be facing.

3. Why is DOT so important?

Answer: If a person with AIDS does not swallow 95% of their pills ON TIME without
missing any doses, the HIV virus mutates and becomes resistant to the
medication. A person with resistant HIV has 2 major problems: one, their bodies stop responding to the medication and they get sick again. In the US, this would result in making a change in the medication regimen. In poor countries, very few HIV medicines are available, and switching
regimens is rarely an option.

The second problem faced by a person with resistant HIV is a problem that
affects all of the rest of us too: if they transmit resistant virus to their
spouse or child, then those newly sick people have no or limited options for
treatment.

DOT could stop the spread of multidrug resistant HIV around the world!!!

4. What's an "Accompagnateur"?

Answer: This is a french word, meaning: accompanying person. We use this term to most
accurately describe the role of the DOT worker. The accompagnateur is a
competent adult who can read and write, who has been chosen by the sick person
to be their advocate, to visit daily to deliver medications, and to go with
them to the hospital when they need help. These special chosen ones undergo
monthly training with us at MARCH to learn how to help, and to supervise the
taking of the medications.

The accompagnateurs in our program frequently go far beyond the call of duty
for our patients. (They like to call them their "friends").
For example, a woman with AIDS who recently delivered a baby was been
threatened with domestic violence by one of her relatives. Her accompagnateur
took her in her own home and harbored her safely there until the situation
could be worked through.