AIDS TreatCost Model user’s manual.

As a result of growing national and international pressure to make ARV treatment available most low resource countries have started to provide antiretroviral (ARV) treatment to people living with HIV/AIDS. However limited information exists on the costs of providing a comprehensive ARV treatment program including necessary health facility infrastructure and staffing requirements as well as drugs and supplies. As a result the Partners for Health Reformplus project (PHRplus) developed the software tool AIDSTREATCOST (ATC) to estimate the total costs of a national ARV treatment program. The tool is designed to provide a basis for policy decisions program planning and budgeting for ARV treatment. The model can also facilitate the development of financing strategies for ARV treatment in resource poor settings. The purpose of the ATC manual is to guide low resource health policy planners and technicians step-by-step through the model in order to build and modify various ARV treatment scenarios and to compare policy options and their respective costs. The user is required to enter demographic epidemiological medical and cost data as well as information on ARV drug conflicts. Once these data are entered users can create policy scenarios for treating given subset of the country (e.g. HIV+ pregnant women and infants) and examine the respective costs for various treatment options. (excerpt)