Mahamat Fayiz Abakar
Profile
PhD proposal: From Syndromic to Etiologic: Integrated One Health surveillance and response in Chad
Supervisor: Jakob Zinsstag
Proposal abstract
In West and Central African region, an estimated 90 million people live in rural areas, depending on agriculture and livestock with limited access to health and other social services. In Chad, over 78% of the total population is rural (agro-pastoralist) and 3.7% among them are mobile pastoralists. These rural areas are characterized by shortage of qualified health workers with health centers mostly not sufficiently equipped. The epidemiological surveillance system conveys information from health centers to the central level, according to the hierarchy of the health system. This is usually done manually with a paper based form in both human and animal surveillance systems. The lack of communication tools and the non-implication of the target population as actors are one of the major causes of the delay in the transmission of urgent health information and largely explain the slow and mostly inadequate responsiveness to outbreaks. In addition, health centers are often quite far from villages and nomad camps. Therefore, officials in health facilities only become aware of health problems of agro-pastoralists and their animals when they reach serious or critical stages. Past syndromic studies show a high frequency of fever-related illness, anemia, respiratory and gastro-intestinal illnesses which remain without an etiologic diagnosis and confirmation. Small scale studies showed the feasibility of mobile communication for health and demographic surveillance. The key requirement is to move from syndromic surveillance towards timely etiologic diagnoses and targeted responses.
The present study aims at improving the early detection capacity of both human and animal epidemiological surveillance systems and develops culturally adapted health interventions. The mobile phone based syndromic surveillance and response (mSSR) could lead to near real-time detection of emerging and endemic diseases among agro-pastoralist populations in Chad. We propose to 1) Conduct a baseline study on the prevalence and patterns of priority diseases in human and animals among agro-pastoralists; 2) Develop and test a culturally validate smartphone application for geo-referenced mobile Syndromic Surveillance and Response (mSSR) for human and animal disease for non-literate users to determine the capacity for community based real-time reporting and response to syndromes like fever related diseases, diarrhea, respiratory complexes, abortions and other infectious diseases outbreaks; 3) Develop and test rapid biomedical diagnostic techniques of infectious pathogens from freshly collected human and animal samples; and 4) Engage community based participation of agro-pastoralists in the development of locally adapted and acceptable health services through a transdisciplinary stakeholder process.
Registration at Uni Basel: 1-2-2014
Final PhD Proposal: 13-7-2015
Supervisor: Jakob Zinsstag
Proposal abstract
In West and Central African region, an estimated 90 million people live in rural areas, depending on agriculture and livestock with limited access to health and other social services. In Chad, over 78% of the total population is rural (agro-pastoralist) and 3.7% among them are mobile pastoralists. These rural areas are characterized by shortage of qualified health workers with health centers mostly not sufficiently equipped. The epidemiological surveillance system conveys information from health centers to the central level, according to the hierarchy of the health system. This is usually done manually with a paper based form in both human and animal surveillance systems. The lack of communication tools and the non-implication of the target population as actors are one of the major causes of the delay in the transmission of urgent health information and largely explain the slow and mostly inadequate responsiveness to outbreaks. In addition, health centers are often quite far from villages and nomad camps. Therefore, officials in health facilities only become aware of health problems of agro-pastoralists and their animals when they reach serious or critical stages. Past syndromic studies show a high frequency of fever-related illness, anemia, respiratory and gastro-intestinal illnesses which remain without an etiologic diagnosis and confirmation. Small scale studies showed the feasibility of mobile communication for health and demographic surveillance. The key requirement is to move from syndromic surveillance towards timely etiologic diagnoses and targeted responses.
The present study aims at improving the early detection capacity of both human and animal epidemiological surveillance systems and develops culturally adapted health interventions. The mobile phone based syndromic surveillance and response (mSSR) could lead to near real-time detection of emerging and endemic diseases among agro-pastoralist populations in Chad. We propose to 1) Conduct a baseline study on the prevalence and patterns of priority diseases in human and animals among agro-pastoralists; 2) Develop and test a culturally validate smartphone application for geo-referenced mobile Syndromic Surveillance and Response (mSSR) for human and animal disease for non-literate users to determine the capacity for community based real-time reporting and response to syndromes like fever related diseases, diarrhea, respiratory complexes, abortions and other infectious diseases outbreaks; 3) Develop and test rapid biomedical diagnostic techniques of infectious pathogens from freshly collected human and animal samples; and 4) Engage community based participation of agro-pastoralists in the development of locally adapted and acceptable health services through a transdisciplinary stakeholder process.
Registration at Uni Basel: 1-2-2014
Final PhD Proposal: 13-7-2015