What we do» Monitoring and evaluation» Epidemiological surveys

Nurses going from house-to-house during the paramet validation survey in Kuka Kebele.

Epidemiological surveys

When needing to treat a disease within a population, it is vital to understand in which setting that disease occurs, who is affected by it, how often it occurs, as well as how and why people contract the disease.

The study of these questions is known as epidemiology. As each disease behaves differently, understanding its epidemiology is essential to planning an effective control and/or elimination strategy.

MoH of countries endemic for parasitic worms, such as schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminths (STH), need to gather epidemiological information through surveys which commonly analyse stool and urine samples to determine the prevalence (the percentage of infected people in a certain area) and the intensity of disease (how heavily infected people are). Our team can share technical expertise across multiple survey designs and throughout the survey process.

Baseline mapping surveys

Parasitic worms can be highly focal in their distribution, meaning that the spread of the disease across the country can vary greatly from area to area. Mapping surveys are completed at the start of public health programmes to determine how many people have the disease in different parts of the country, providing the fundamental data required to guide the treatment intervention.

Reassessment surveys

Reassessment surveys are used to assess how regular treatment campaigns have changed the spread of disease since the mapping survey. This allows the MoH to revise their treatment and additional intervention strategy accordingly and plan more targeted activities, so vulnerable and underserved communities are reached.

We are leading efforts to make innovative mapping and reassessment methodologies available to MoH and the World Health Organization to further improve the accuracy, efficiency and usefulness of epidemiological data, covering areas such as geostatistical epidemiology and disease modelling. See more in the Research Projects section.