Skip to main content
Home / Public Health Action, Volume 3, Number 2

Open Access Rapid home-based human immunodeficiency virus testing to reduce costs in a large tuberculosis cohort study [Short communication]

Download Article:
To reduce costs in a large tuberculosis household contact cohort study in Lima, Peru, we replaced laboratory-based human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing with home-based rapid HIV testing. We developed a protocol and training course to prepare staff for the new strategy; these included role-playing for home-based deployment of the Determine® HIV 1/2 Ag/Ac Combo HIV test. Although the rapid HIV test produced more false-positives, the overall cost per participant tested, refusal rate and time to confirmatory HIV testing were lower with the home-based rapid testing strategy compared to the original approach. Rapid testing could be used in similar research or routine care settings.

Keywords: TB; human immunodeficiency virus; rapid testing

Document Type: Research Article

Affiliations: 1: Partners In Health, Boston, Massachusetts, USA 2: Socios En Salud, Lima, Peru 3: Division of Global Health Equity, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA 4: Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA_contents"> ">Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Publication date: 21 June 2013

More about this publication?

  • Public Health Action (PHA), The Union's quarterly Open Access journal, welcomes the submission of articles on operational research. It publishes high-quality scientific research on health services, providing new knowledge on how to improve access, equity, quality and efficiency of health systems and services.

    The Editors will consider any manuscript reporting original research on quality improvements, cost-benefit analysis, legislation, training and capacity building, with a focus on all relevant areas of public health (e.g. infection control, nutrition, TB, HIV, vaccines, smoking, COVID-19, microbial resistance, outbreaks etc).

  • Editorial Board
  • Information for Authors
  • International Journal of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease
  • Public Health Action
  • Ingenta Connect is not responsible for the content or availability of external websites

Share Content

  • Access Key
  • Free content
  • Partial Free content
  • New content
  • Open access content
  • Partial Open access content
  • Subscribed content
  • Partial Subscribed content
  • Free trial content