Literature review report: communication sharing practices and needs of people living with HIV: a case of Nkangala in Mpumalanga and Ekurhuleni in Gauteng

The literature reviewed initiatives of health communication in general, and adherence communication specifically in other developing countries, looking particularly at factors that accounted for their success or lack of it. Based on a common understanding that a good communication strategy should be grounded on sound theory, the initial discussion in this review points to some of the pertinent theoretical frameworks that can use used to develop an adherence communication strategy and shows how they can be applied to that strategy. The review then goes on to identify some of the important characteristics of a communication model, in order to inform an effective communication framework. It further discusses some of the successful health communication and adherence programmes, resources and information sharing practices that have been used in other developing countries. The strength and weaknesses of programmes that were implemented in several countries across Africa and beyond are dealt with in detail, as they become lessons for the envisaged CCI strategy. This was meant to identify growing concerns about the problem of treatment initiation and non-adherence to ART and lessons learnt. The review then delves into specific tools and resources that have been used in other countries and highlights some of the features that made the tools useful. The concluding remarks argues for the development of an evidence based strategy, that employs the tenets of multimodality, contextualises messages and capitalises on resources already available for communication and that targeted users are already familiar with.