EVALUATION OF EARLY DETECTION PROGRAM OF HYPERTENSION AND DIABETES MELLITUS AT AL-KARKH SECTOR FOR PRIMARY HEALTH CARE /BAGHDAD (Published)
Background-Both of hypertension and diabetes represent serious problems of public health importance with significant morbidity and mortality, fortunately the natural history of both of them is well studied and either one of them have preclinical (asymptomatic) stage with availability of screening and diagnostic tools, this make both diseases suitable for screening, aiming to early detection and control of both of them Aim of the study: to 1)determine how often client of al-Karkh sector are screened for hypertension &diabetes through the existing program 2) estimate screening efficiency based on :The number needed to screen to diagnose one case in the whole program, for hypertension & diabetes mellitus respectively &How often the program affects the prevalence of the diseases .Design: Across-sectional study from the 1st of Jan. to the 31st of Dec. 2011 of 12 primary health care centers at Al -Karkh sector using a statistical form approved by Iraqi MOH. Results: The coverage rate was 94.58% of number should be screened, the detection ability of the program was 2.11% for both diseases while number needed to screen to diagnose one case in the whole program was 47, there was an increase in the prevalence of both diseases by 2% with application of the program, the ratio of cases diagnosed by the program to those diagnosed outside the program was 1:5.6. Conclusions Most of cases of hypertension and diabetes at Al-Karkh sector were diagnosed outside the program and about half of those involved in the program didn’t return for the second diagnostic test, this make the overall results of the program low. This low yield result should not be a barrier against program application but should be appoint for program modification since there’s a lot of evidences that supports its value for better control & prevention of complications of both diseases.
Keywords: Coverage Rate, Detection Ability(DA), Number Needed To Screen (NNS), Number Screened(NS), Positive Screened Test (+Ve ST)