One day in October 2025, Prisca’s Case Worker, Abigail, was reviewing the case plan with her to identify barriers to achieving HIV viral load suppression and ensuring her child remained HIV-free. Then Prisca mentioned to Abigail that she was experiencing unusual menstrual bleeding. Abigail immediately escorted Prisca to a nearby health facility where she was screened for cervical cancer using visual inspection with acetic acid and she was found with precancerous lesions. The health facility escalated the case to senior PCZ technical officers on the ground after the diagnosis showed that the lesions were too big to be treated on a single visit onsite. Prisca needed a procedure called Loop Electrosurgical Excision Procedure (LEEP) which was not offered in the health facility but was offered in a district hospital in a nearby town, located 250 Kilometers from Prisca’s hometown. Transport was needed.

Annie, the PCZ Technical Officer and a Clinical Officer, observed:
“In our context with high incidence of both HIV (particularly among young women) and cervical cancer, such co-morbidities are becoming increasingly common in women.” We are here as ECAPs to take timely lifesaving services to women. Cervical Cancer is preventable and curable; HIV is preventable and treatable; we will not waste time as we act at community level to bring these lifesaving services to women.”

Thanks to the blended financing model that PCZ has adopted, transport was provided by a private donor, and Prisca successfully completed her referral to LEEP! As a breadwinner in the family, the mother could not have been happier!