Yes / With the aim of targeting high-risk hidden heterosexual young people for Chlamydia trachomatis (CT) testing, an innovative web-based screening strategy using Respondent Driven Sampling (RDS) and home-based CT testing, was developed, piloted and evaluated. Two STI clinic nurses encouraged 37 CT positive heterosexual young people (aged 16-25 years), called index clients, to recruit peers from their social and sexual networks using the web-based screening strategy. Eligible peers (young, living in the study area) could request a home-based CT test and recruit other peers. Twelve (40%) index clients recruited 35 peers. Two of these peers recruited other peers (n = 7). In total, 35 recruited peers were eligible for participation; ten of them (29%) requested a test and eight tested. Seven tested for the first time and one (13%) was positive. Most peers were female friends (80%). Nurses were positive about using the strategy. The screening strategy is feasible for targeting the hidden social network. However, uptake among men and recruitment of sex-partners is low and RDS stopped early. Future studies are needed to explore the sustainability, cost-effectiveness, and impact of strategies that target people at risk who are not effectively reached by regular health care.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:BRADFORD/oai:bradscholars.brad.ac.uk:10454/9233 |
| Date | January 2015 |
| Creators | Theunissen, K., Hoebe, C., Kok, G., Crutzen, R., Kara-Zaitri, Chakib, de Vries, N., van Bergen, J., Hamilton, R., van der Sande, M., Dukers-Muijrers, N. |
| Source Sets | Bradford Scholars |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Article, Published version |
| Rights | © 2015 The Authors. This article is an Open Access article distributed under the Creative Commons CC-BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) |
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