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The potential role of peripheral health workers and community key informants in the rapid assessment of community burden of disease: the example of lymphatic filariasis
Author(s) -
Gyapong John O.,
Gyapong John O.,
Webber Roger H.,
Bennett Steve
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
tropical medicine and international health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.056
H-Index - 114
eISSN - 1365-3156
pISSN - 1360-2276
DOI - 10.1046/j.1365-3156.1998.00266.x
Subject(s) - lymphatic filariasis , medicine , filariasis , environmental health , community health , hydrocele , public health , family medicine , pathology , surgery , immunology , helminths
Data for planning disease control programs in most developing countries is often not available because they are usually expensive to gather. This study explored the potential use of peripheral health staff and community key informants in gathering community‐level data about lymphatic filariasis. Agreement between findings of health workers and those of physicians was very high (κ 0.66–0.87) for the clinical conditions examined. The prevalence of hydrocele was found to be a good predictor of communities at risk of filariasis. Community key informants provided very useful qualitative and quantitative data on the prevalence of clinical filariasis. The need to use nontraditional health professionals in gathering data for planing control programs is discussed.