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In November 2013 Reinou S. Groen succesfully defended her thesis on surgical needs in low and middle income countries. Not included in this thesis, but summarized here, is an evaluation that was conducted into the use of a survey tool. The Surgeons OverSeas Assessment of Surgical need (SOSAS) is developed to evaluate the prevalence of surgically treatable diseases at community level. In a cross-sectional evaluation SOSAS enumerators were asked to anonymously complete a questionnaire about their opinion on the survey questions and execution. The objective was to determine improvements for further use of SOSAS and to solicit information on their experiences during the survey execution. Responses indicated that SOSAS and the iPad were well explained. The greatest difficulty was listing the ages of household members and questions related to the groin, genitalia and menstruation. Explanation of random sampling of household members and real-time translation were the most difficult aspects of survey execution. In conclusion, SOSAS was successfully used during a countrywide assessment of surgical need in Sierra Leone. Although there were issues with translation and implementation of the survey, on the whole, enumerators found the tool adequate and easily adopted the use of iPads in data collection. Translation into local languages is recommended if feasible.
For the full article and references of the study please visit: www.nvtg.org
The PhD thesis can be uploaded at: http://dare.uva.nl/record/456716
Corresponding author:
Reinou S. Groen, MD, MIH, PhD
rsgroen@hotmail.com
rgroen1@jhmi.edu
