Emerging advantages and drawbacks of telephone surveying in public health research in Ireland and the U.K

BACKGROUND: Telephone surveys have been used widely in public health research internationally and are being increasingly used in Ireland and the U.K. METHODS: This study compared three telephone surveys conducted on the island of Ireland from 2000 to 2004, examining study methodology, outcome measures and the per unit cost of each completed survey. We critically examined these population-based surveys which all explored health related attitudes and behaviours. RESULTS: Over the period from 2000 to 2005 the percentage of calls which succeeded in contacting an eligible member of the public fell, from 52.9% to 31.8%. There was a drop in response rates to the surveys (once contact was established) from 58.6% to 17.7%. Costs per completed interview rose from €4.48 to €15.65. Respondents were prepared to spend 10–15 minutes being surveyed, but longer surveys yielded poorer completion rates. Respondents were willing to discuss issues of a sensitive nature. Interviews after 9 pm were less successful, with complaints about the lateness of the call. Randomisation from electronic residential telephone directory databases excluded all ex-directory numbers and thus was not as representative of the general population as number generation by the hundred-bank method. However the directory database was more efficient in excluding business and fax numbers. CONCLUSION: Researchers should take cognisance of under-representativeness of land-line telephone surveys, of the increasing difficulties in contacting the public and of mounting personnel costs. We conclude that telephone surveying now requires additional strategies such as a multimode approach, or incentivisation, to be a useful, cost-effective means of acquiring data on public health matters in Ireland and the U.K

Individual and contextual factors influencing patient attrition from antiretroviral therapy care in an urban community of Lusaka, Zambia.

BACKGROUND: Despite the relatively effective roll-out of free life-prolonging antiretroviral therapy (ART) in public sector clinics in Zambia since 2005, and the proven efficacy of ART, some people living with HIV (PLHIV) are abandoning the treatment. Drawing on a wider ethnographic study in a predominantly low-income, high-density residential area of Lusaka, this paper reports the reasons why PLHIV opted to discontinue their HIV treatment. METHODS: Opened-ended, in-depth interviews were held with PLHIV who had stopped ART (n =25), ART clinic staff (n=5), religious leaders (n=5), herbal medicine providers (n=5) and lay home-based caregivers (n=5). In addition, participant observations were conducted in the study setting for 18 months. Interview data were analysed using open coding first, and then interpreted using latent content analysis. The presentation of the results is guided by a social-ecological framework. FINDINGS: Patient attrition from ART care is influenced by an interplay of personal, social, health system and structural-level factors. While improved corporeal health, side effects and need for normalcy diminished motivation to continue with treatment, individuals also weighed the social and economic costs of continued uptake of treatment. Long waiting times for medical care and placing "defaulters" on intensive adherence counselling in the context of insecure labour conditions and livelihood constraints not only imposed opportunity costs which patients were not willing to forego, but also forced individuals to balance physical health with social integrity, which sometimes forced them to opt for faith healing and traditional medicine. CONCLUSIONS: Complex and dynamic interplay of personal, social, health system and structural-level factors coalesces to influence patient attrition from ART care. Consequently, while patient-centred interventions are required, efforts should be made to improve ART care by extending and establishing flexible ART clinic hours, improving patient-provider dialogue about treatment experiences and being mindful of the way intensive adherence counselling is being enforced. In the context of insecure labour conditions and fragile livelihoods, this would enable individuals to more easily balance time for treatment and their livelihoods. As a corollary, the perceived efficacy of alternative treatment and faith healing needs to be challenged through sensitizations targeting patients, religious leaders/faith healers and herbal medicine providers