EXPRESSION OF INTEREST FOR PROVISION OF QUALITY ASSURANCE TO NON-FRANCHISED FACILITIES IN SUPPORT OF AN ADOLESCENT AND YOUTH SEXUAL AND REPRODUCTIVE H

Background

Tiko Africa is a global non-profit organisation that is headquartered in South Africa. Our main aim is to motivate young people to make positive Reproductive Health choices using innovative technology, real-time data, and behavioural insights. Through our digital platform, Tiko, and our local ecosystem of partners, we connect Tiko members to existing local service providers to meet their Sexual Reproductive Health and wellness needs. As part of this ecosystem, TIKO provides access to Quality-assured Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) services through a network of private and public health facilities and pharmacies. To ensure quality in the relevant services accessed by adolescents and youth through the Tiko platform, Triggerise is looking to work with a pool of Independent Quality Assurance (QA) Providers to provide Quality Assurance (QA) baseline audit and Quality Improvement (QI) to the private non-franchised health facilities within the ecosystem. The provision of these services will be done through what will be called the TIKO QA Marketplace to ensure that the private non-franchised facilities are:

At the expected level to quality to provide quality Sexual and Reproductive Health services & Rights (SRHR) to adolescent youths that include contraceptives, HIV testing services, pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), antiretroviral treatment (ART) and mental health by conducting;

• Clinical Quality Audits to identify QA gaps in Capacity building/ training and Competency Assessments of the service providers.
• Continuous support supervision to correctly and accurately offer Adolescent youth-friendly AYSRH services by addressing the identified QA gaps as part of Quality improvement plan and continuous support.
• Ensuring updated facilities/service providers licences and re-certification requirements according to the respective governing bodies by law in the country.
• Data quality assessments to ensure good data quality through proper documentation and reporting to the respective districts.

Scope of Work (SOW) and Expectations

TIKO is registered in Uganda and has its main office in Kampala located at Regus Offices, 4th floor Acacia Mall , operating in Kampala and Wakiso District for now.

TIKO expects all facilities onboarded on the Tiko platform to offer AYSRH services and maintain high levels of Quality in service provision. Prior to working with TIKO, a service readiness and availability assessment (SARA) will be conducted by TIKO in the facilities to ensure they meet the minimum requirements for service delivery. This forms part of due diligence done by TIKO to ensure that private health providers on boarded onto the Tiko Platform meet the required legal threshold, have the required infrastructure and goodwill for AYSRH service delivery.

Therefore, the contracted independent QA providers from the TIKO QA Marketplace will be expected to provide Quality Assurance (QA) support Supervision to private and non-franchised facilities. The Scope of work will include the following activities:

• Clinical Quality and competency assessment audits, baseline needs assessments and development of quality improvement plans (QIP);
• Training needs and competency assessments;
• Periodical support supervision visits;
• Compliance with clinical regulations and licensing requirements.

Below is a detail on the QA expectations of each independent QA provider that will participate in the Tiko QA Marketplace.

• Conduct a clinical audit and baseline assessment per facility to inform QIP development.
• Conduct competency assessments to identify gaps/needs for each Tiko service provider and develop QIP
• Provide training to address competency gaps and ensure upskilling based on the baseline assessment and clinical audit findings.(Must have training kits and the necessary job aids according to MOH)
• Conduct competency upskilling and reskilling to improve skills, knowledge and attitude of TIKO service providers based on the competency assessment findings and identified gaps
• Ensure that staff operating in each facility are qualified and certified by the respective bodies to provide services and that noted cases of non-compliance are addressed in a timely manner to ensure the facilities remain active on the TIKO platform.
• Submit timely QA reports, which will include QIPs and evidence of support supervision visit activities, as well as compliance to TIKO relevant policies as highlighted in the contract.
• Report and escalate all safeguarding incidences to TIKO in line with the Safeguarding Escalation TIKO processes.
• Report all adverse events to TIKO QA Specialist within 24 hours for assistance/Support.

TIKO will support successful applicants to undertake the above scope of work with a package of tools, checklists, codes of conduct and QA reporting templates to ensure that they successfully undertake the above activities.

Examples of Expected Deliverables

Through our Tiko QA Marketplace, TIKO will contract for 2 types of QA providers as follows;

1. One which will focus on QA audits and development of the QIP (QA provider 1),
2. The other will focus on the implementation and management of the QIP (QA provider 2).

The expectations and deliverables of the two different QA providers are found below:

Deliverables for Independent QA Provider 1

Main Role: QA Auditor

Main Deliverable: Independent QA Audit Report

• Clinical audits: clinical facility audits conducted for each facility on the TIKO platform annually to identify QA Quality Improvement gaps.
• Training needs and competency assessment: competency and training needs gaps identified on the different health offers for each facility.
• QIPs: Quality Improvement Plans (QIP) developed using gaps identified from SARA, and the clinical audit (including identifying infrastructural, process, and documentation gaps), and training needs assessments.
• Preceding QIP appraisals: achievements and rectification of gaps from the previous QIPs confirmed and noted
• Report: final summary report (Independent QA1 audit report) from the assessments produced, shared and handed over to the TIKO QA Specialist.
• Report on learnings and Recommendations: learnings documented, presented and discusse with TIKO QA Specialist.

Example of deliverables for QA Provider 2

Main Role: Coach / Mentor / Trainer

Main Deliverable: Competent providers in non-franchised private facilities

• Updated QIP and QA implementation work plan: a detailed work plan shared with the TIKO QA Specialist to specify the activities, resources and timelines it will take to execute the developed Quality Improvement Plans (QIPs)
• QIP implementation: continuous progress reports on the gaps rectified and achievements against the key QIP milestones
• Clinical competency conducted: Report on the number of Tiko providers who are fully competent for the relevant services provided and develop an action plan for continuous competency development for all the providers.
• Training (onsite and off site) mentorship and coaching conducted: training reports provided to indicate the number of training sessions conducted and competency scoring of each facility service providers to indicate improvement.
• Infrastructure, process and documentation corrections: correcting the gaps identified on infrastructure, process and documentation clinical records audit..
• Final assessment and reporting: performance review with the provider to discuss client rating reports and client exit reports and service uptake numbers.
• Report on learnings and Recommendations: learnings documented, presented, and discussed with the TIKO QA team.

Examples of Roles and Responsibilities for Independent QA Provider 1: Quality Assurance Auditor

• Quality Audits: Quality assessment to identify the service delivery gaps per facility in the specific areas of service provision.
• QIP Development: Development of SMART action plans for the identified gaps per facility assessed.
• Report preparation: prepare both a narrative and quantitative reports for each facility assessed.

Examples of Roles and Responsibilities for Independent QA Provider 2: Coach / Mentor / Trainer

• Implementation of the Development action plans as identified by QA1
• Mentorship and training plans for service providers on the identified gaps
• Review meetings with TIKO team monthly/bi monthly to discuss QA progress per facility, client rating reports and client exit reports and service uptake numbers as per TIKO dashboards.

Means of Verification Examples

Facility specific reports submitted by QA Provider 1

Review of Supervision records.

Verification visits to the assessed facilities.

Facility specific reports submitted by QA Provider 2

Review of Supervision records.

Client exit reports and client rating reports.

Mystery client reports.

Table 1: Examples of expected deliverables for the Tiko QA Marketplace

* QA Provider 2 to conduct, coordinate and facilitate training in collaboration with training centres and the Ministry of Health that offers comprehensive training for health facilities.

Period of the Engagement

On a needs basis, from September 2024. The selected service providers will form part of the pre-qualified pool of QA Providers for the Tiko QA Marketplace.

Period of Validity of Bids

Bids shall remain valid for 7 working days after the date of bid opening prescribed by TIKO UG. In exceptional circumstances, TIKO UG may request the Bidders to extend the period of validity. The request and the responses therefore shall be made in writing by email. A bidder agreeing to the request will not be required nor permitted to modify the bid.