At the Heart of Research: Training CHWs to Collect Epidemiologic Data in Rural South Africa

Social and Scientific Systems (SSS) will pilot an approach to using Home Based Care Workers (HBCWs) in an epidemiologic study of pregnancy loss among rural women 20-30 years of age from eight South African villages. With careful training and monitoring, the pilot will assess whether HBCWs can train other HBCWs to effectively recruit participants, maintain high retention rates and collect high quality data in an effective manner while building capacity in-country. If successful, the method will be implemented with up to 96 HBCWs in 46 villages.

HBCWs from local villages will be trained to recruit and retain participants into the study, and provide feedback on effective recruitment strategies and challenges in the local setting; they will also undergo training and certification in the administration of monthly interviews, housing observation forms, and monthly urine pregnancy testing. Initially, two HBCWs will be trained and certified as part of a clinic team who will collect baseline data from 400 participants during clinic visits and follow-up data in home visits. After an intensive two week training and one month of field work with the field coordinators these HBCWs will train and certify 14 HBCWs in these methods.

The proposed model builds research capacity in two ways: by partnering with HBCWs in South Africa researchers will train local talent to effectively recruit and retain potential study participants in rural communities and disseminate public health information; and furthermore, this model will place HBCWs in the heart of research - data collection, including collection of biologic specimens.