National and sub-national variation in patterns of febrile case management in sub-Saharan Africa

Victor A. Alegana (), Joseph Maina, Paul O. Ouma, Peter M. Macharia, Jim Wright, Peter M. Atkinson, Emelda A. Okiro, Robert W. Snow and Andrew J. Tatem
Additional contact information
Victor A. Alegana: University of Southampton
Joseph Maina: Kenya Medical Research Institute-Wellcome Trust Research Programme
Paul O. Ouma: Kenya Medical Research Institute-Wellcome Trust Research Programme
Peter M. Macharia: Kenya Medical Research Institute-Wellcome Trust Research Programme
Jim Wright: University of Southampton
Peter M. Atkinson: University of Southampton
Emelda A. Okiro: Kenya Medical Research Institute-Wellcome Trust Research Programme
Robert W. Snow: Kenya Medical Research Institute-Wellcome Trust Research Programme
Andrew J. Tatem: University of Southampton

Nature Communications, 2018, vol. 9, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Abstract Given national healthcare coverage gaps, understanding treatment-seeking behaviour for fever is crucial for the management of childhood illness and to reduce deaths. Here, we conduct a modelling study triangulating household survey data for fever in children under the age of five years with georeferenced public health facility databases (n = 86,442 facilities) in 29 countries across sub-Saharan Africa, to estimate the probability of seeking treatment for fever at public facilities. A Bayesian item response theory framework is used to estimate this probability based on reported fever episodes, treatment choice, residence, and estimated travel-time to the nearest public-sector health facility. Findings show inter- and intra-country variation, with the likelihood of seeking treatment for fever less than 50% in 16 countries. Results highlight the need to invest in public healthcare and related databases. The variation in public sector use illustrates the need to include such modelling in future infectious disease burden estimation.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-07536-9 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:9:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-018-07536-9

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-07536-9

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().