During December 2020 and January 2021, the Bradford Teaching Hospitals (BTH) Viral Hepatitis team worked with the Homeless Outreach Partnership (HOP) team, the Salvation Army in Bradford and the Hepatitis C Trust (HCT), to offer BBV testing. The teams visited accommodation where homeless people have been housed temporarily by HOP.
The Outreach team
The team consisted of staff from BTH, the HOP, Salvation Army and peers from the HCT, (pictured below).
BTH – Rhian Simpson Clinical Nurse Specialist
HOP – Becky Branagan & Craig Wilkinson
Salvation Army – Andrea Jackson
HCT – John Fox & Mark Bennett & Allison Downing
The testing events utilised the Salvation Army’s outreach bus and community rooms within the various accommodation venues with the HOP and Salvation Army’s clients. To boost attendance at the events the Viral Hepatitis team provided toiletries and vouchers as incentives to encourage people to get tested. In total
- 48 people were screened for HCV antibodies by the Hepatitis C Peer support team
- There were 15 positive antibody tests
- All 15 were tested for HCV-PCR-RNA by the BTH nurse
The outcomes from the PCR Tests
- 2 patients have started treatment
- 2 patients are undergoing assessments prior to treatment
- 4 patients are too chaotic to engage at present
- 7 results are pending