Gaining and sustaining schistosomiasis control: study protocol and baseline data prior to different treatment strategies in five African countries

26 May 2016
Amara E. Ezeamama, Chun-La He, Ye Shen, Xiao-Ping Yin, Sue C. Binder, Carl H. Campbell Jr., Stephen Rathbun, Christopher C. Whalen, Eliézer K. N’Goran, Jürg Utzinger, Annette Olsen, Pascal Magnussen, Safari Kinung’hi, Alan Fenwick, Anna Phillips, Josefo Ferro, Diana M. S. Karanja, Pauline N. M. Mwinzi, Susan Montgomery, W. Evan Secor, Amina Hamidou, Amadou Garba, Charles H. King & Daniel G. Colley

Background

The Schistosomiasis Consortium for Operational Research and Evaluation (SCORE) was established in 2008 to answer strategic questions about schistosomiasis control. For programme managers, a high-priority question is: what are the most cost-effective strategies for delivering preventive chemotherapy (PCT) with praziquantel (PZQ)? This paper describes the process SCORE used to transform this question into a harmonized research protocol, the study design for answering this question, the village eligibility assessments and data resulting from the first year of the study.

Methods

Beginning in 2009, SCORE held a series of meetings to specify empirical questions and design studies related to different schedules of PCT for schistosomiasis control in communities with high (gaining control studies) and moderate (sustaining control studies) prevalence of Schistosoma infection among school-aged children. Seven studies are currently being implemented in five African countries. During the first year, villages were screened for eligibility, and data were collected on prevalence and intensity of infection prior to randomisation and the implementation of different schemes of PZQ intervention strategies.

Results

These studies of different treatment schedules with PZQ will provide the most comprehensive data thus far on the optimal frequency and continuity of PCT for schistosomiasis infection and morbidity control.

Conclusions

We expect that the study outcomes will provide data for decision-making for country programme managers and a rich resource of information to the schistosomiasis research community.