Telephone helplines (also known as hotlines) are telephone lines set up to take calls from people seeking information on specific topics—such as (in the case of this Best Practice study) HIV/AIDS. Four programmes were chosen to illustrate the Best Practice criteria for helplines: the AIDS Helpline of South Africa’s Department of Health, the reproductive health and sexuality helpline offered by a New Delhi-based nongovernmental organization (NGO) called Talking about Reproductive and Sexual Health Issues (TARSHI), the National AIDS Hotline of Trinidad and Tobago, and the hotline run by Remedios AIDS Foundation of Manila, the Philippines. Together, they illustrate the principles that make helplines so successful in providing HIV/AIDS information and counselling, the challenges helplines face, and the creative approaches that can be taken to meet those challenges.
