THE RAPID VILLAGE SURVEY IN TUBERCULOSIS-CONTROL

Setting: Khon Kaen Province, North-East Thailand. Objective: To develo p a rapid and cheap method of surveying a population cluster (a villag e) to establish the prevalence of sputum-positive tuberculosis. Design : Based on previous experience a standardized 'rapid village survey' m ethod was designed and tested. In this method a survey team of health workers is constituted and trained. Before and at the beginning of a v isit to a village the population receives information about tuberculos is, and only individuals with chest symptoms are invited to report vol untarily to the survey team for examination. Active tracing of a previ ously compiled 'list of suspects and contacts' complements the identif ication of cases. The number of community members to be examined is th us much lower. A cluster sample of the provincial population was made (20 730 people in 40 villages). The population in each village was sur veyed first by the Rapid Village Survey method, then, 1 week later, by the conventional method of examining every individual registered in e ach village.Results: In the rapid village survey 14 cases of sputum-po sitive tuberculosis were detected and in the conventional survey 15 ca ses. Conclusion: The rapid method produces results comparable to the s urvey of the total sample population for less than half of the cost.