The Global Trachoma Mapping Project: Methodology of a 34-Country Population-Based Study. (June 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Solomon, Anthony W.; Pavluck, Alexandre L.; Courtright, Paul; Aboe, Agatha; Adamu, Liknaw; Alemayehu, Wondu; Alemu, Menbere; Alexander, Neal D. E.; Kello, Amir Bedri; Bero, Berhanu; Brooker, Simon J.; Chu, Brian K.; Dejene, Michael; Emerson, Paul M.; Flueckiger, Rebecca M.; Gadisa, Solomon; Gass, Katherine; Gebre, Teshome; Habtamu, Zelalem; Harvey, Erik; Haslam, Dominic; King, Jonathan D.; Mesurier, Richard Le; Lewallen, Susan; Lietman, Thomas M.; MacArthur, Chad; Mariotti, Silvio P.; Massey, Anna; Mathieu, Els; Mekasha, Addis; Millar, Tom; Mpyet, Caleb; Muñoz, Beatriz E.; Ngondi, Jeremiah; Ogden, Stephanie; Pearce, Joseph; Sarah, Virginia; Sisay, Alemayehu; Smith, Jennifer L.; Taylor, Hugh R.; Thomson, Jo; West, Sheila K.; Willis, Rebecca; Bush, Simon; Haddad, Danny; Foster, Allen;
• Is Part Of: Ophthalmic epidemiology. Volume 22:Number 3(2015)
• Page Start: 214
• Page End: 225
• Publication Date: 2015-06
• Subjects: Blindness -- Prevention -- Periodicals; Eye -- Diseases -- Epidemiology -- Periodicals; Ophthalmology -- Periodicals; 614.5997
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0928-6586

Abstract

<abstract> <title>ABSTRACT</title> <p> <italic>Purpose</italic>: To complete the baseline trachoma map worldwide by conducting population-based surveys in an estimated 1238 suspected endemic districts of 34 countries.</p> <p> <italic>Methods</italic>: A series of national and sub-national projects owned, managed and staffed by ministries of health, conduct house-to-house cluster random sample surveys in evaluation units, which generally correspond to "health district" size: populations of 100, 000–250, 000 people. In each evaluation unit, we invite all residents aged 1 year and older from <italic>h</italic> households in each of <italic>c</italic> clusters to be examined for clinical signs of trachoma, where <italic>h</italic> is the number of households that can be seen by 1 team in 1 day, and the product <italic>h</italic> × <italic>c</italic> is calculated to facilitate recruitment of 1019 children aged 1–9 years. In addition to individual-level demographic and clinical data, household-level water, sanitation and hygiene data are entered into the purpose-built LINKS application on Android smartphones, transmitted to the Cloud, and cleaned, analyzed and ministry-of-health-approved via a secure web-based portal. The main outcome measures are the evaluation unit-level prevalence of follicular trachoma in children aged 1–9 years, prevalence of trachomatous trichiasis in adults aged 15 + years, percentage of households using safe methods for disposal of human feces, and percentage of households with proximate access to water for personal hygiene purposes.</p> <p> <italic>Results</italic>: In the first year of fieldwork, 347 field teams commenced work in 21 projects in 7 countries.</p> <p> <italic>Conclusion</italic>: With an approach that is innovative in design and scale, we aim to complete baseline mapping of trachoma throughout the world in 2015.</p> </abstract>