Screening Model for New Leprosy Cases in Areas with Epidemiological Indications in 2023: A Case Study of Ubon Ratchathani Province

Abstract

This action study aimed to develop a leprosy screening model in the areas with specific epidemiological indicators. Two target groups were the stakeholders in model development consist of 20 people who responsible for leprosy control in Samrong District, and the participant who launched the model implementation consist of 46 Public Health volunteers (PHVs) and 3 officers from three districts of Kud Khaopun, Pho Sai, and Samrong, Ubon Ratchathani Province. The development process utilized questionnaires, interviews, group discussions, quantitative data analysis with a Pair T-Test, and qualitative data analysis through content analysis. The study took place from July 2023 to November 2024.

The research findings revealed that 80.4 percent of public health volunteers were female, and 52 percent had been involved in leprosy care for less than five years. Several issues was found PHVs lacked of knowledge, skills, and confidence for Leprosy screening, the media for educate PHVs was inappropriately, screening procedures was unclear, and data collection system was missing. The resulting form is the Task Model, which consists of Training, adopt an innovation, Skills, and Knowledge providing. This model was focuses on training and an adopt innovation of video clips of Leprosy knowledge which was a tool for providing knowledge and skills of Leprosy screening for PHVs, implementation of leprosy screening activities, evaluation and continuous monitoring. The Task Model was improvement in the knowledge of leprosy among public health volunteers significantly (P < 0.01), the average knowledge score before and after implementation was 3.59 (S.D. = 0.77) and 4.28 (S.D. = 0.72) respectively. The PHVs was screened 213 people in the community, discovering 7 individuals with skin lesions, 3 of whom met the criteria for suspected leprosy. They then scheduled appointments for further monitoring under DDC guidelines. Moreover, the PHVs reported greater confidence in their screening abilities. This showcases the effectiveness of the Task Model in enhancing the leprosy screening within the community by improving the knowledge and skills of PHVs and its also boosting their confidence. This approach has the potential to be adapted for use in other communities with similar epidemiological profiles to improve the efficiency of leprosy screening at the local level.