assignment-Article summaries

Instructions: 

• Visit the Center for Disease Control Emerging Infectious Disease website. Choose one journal, article, or case study and explain the type of research design that was used in this study. Summarize your source, and be sure to include an explanation of the following questions in your response:
  • Is it evident that primary, secondary, or meta-analysis was used?
  • What role did surveys play, if any? Explain.
  • Were there any flaws or discrepancies in the data? Why or why not?
• Locate two journal articles, one that uses descriptive epidemiology, and the other that uses analytic epidemiology. Summarize each article and compare and contrast the research designs.
• Review this site: http://www.onlineethics.org/cms/8116.aspx then write a summary of recommendations on Protecting Research Participants.

Article Summary review

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Introduction

In the article ‘Public Health Program for Decreasing Risk for Ebola Virus Disease Resurgence from Survivors of the 2013–2016 Outbreak, Guinea’ (Keita et al., 2020),  the study is based on the 2013-2016 Ebola virus Disease outbreak which was reported to be the largest since the virus was first discovered in 1978.  By using secondary analysis of literature, the paper shows that the outbreak was reported in 29,000 cases and resulted in a total of 11,000 deaths and one of the largest known cohort of the Ebola virus disease in history. During the time of the study, the second-largest Ebola Virus outbreak was present in the Democratic Republic of Congo, at reported 3,340 cases and a total of 2,207 deaths as of December 2019 (Keita et al., 2020). 

In mid-2015, after looking at the high number of survivors and several episodes related to the Ebola virus disease outbreak, the issue was linked to the exposure that people had with the survivor’s body fluids. In this way, the world health organization came up with a strategy that will see the management of survivors and mitigate the risk of a new outbreak after the various lines of transmission had been put under control. This included vaginal fluids, semen, sweat, urine, aqueous humor, and breast milk (Keita et al., 2020).  The study looks at the impact of an integrated program that was meant to address the medical and follow up needs of the survivors of Ebola and the risk of getting reintroduced to the virus through routine health services and facilities.  

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Use of primary, secondary or meta-analysis

In a research paper, the primary analysis usually refers to the original analysis of data as used in the research study; it consists of what an individual or a group of researchers are going to imagine in regard to the application of various statistical methods. In the secondary analysis, the researcher is going to re-analyze the date for the main purpose being to answer the original research question using the right statistical techniques, or answering the new question through old data. Secondary analysis a very important part of any research and provides evidence on the study (Mengersen, Gurevitch, & Schmid, 2013). A meta-analysis will refer to the analysis of both primary and secondary data.

In this study, it is evident that a meta-analysis of data was done. First, for the primary analysis, the researchers contacted all Ebola virus disease survivors in Guinea that were already documented in the Ministry of Health database. They also conducted several community engagement activities to be able to deliver the survivor's package. Between April 1 to September 30, 2016, the communication line between the SA-Client and survivors remained active (Keita et al., 2020). The inclusion criteria for the study were survivors of Ebola virus disease who were allowed to participate in the program so long as they were able to indicate that they possessed the certificate of medical clearance which they were given when they have been discharged from the Ebola virus treatment unit. During the implementation of the project, participants were required to report health alerts when found in their households, and they were also requested to provide fluid body specimens for laboratory testing. A total of 1,075 of the 1215 participants followed up occurred at a median of 16 months after they were discharged(Keita et al., 2020). About 784 of these participates actually reported alerts of around 372 of the 408 eligible survivors as having more than one semen specimen tested. Out of the total 817 specimens, five samples from 4 of the survivor actually came out positive in 512 days after they were discharged. No breast milk or lochia tested positive.  The main reason for the study was to establish the importance of long term monitoring of survivors of the Ebola virus disease. 

The role of the survey

In this study, the survey plays a very important role in identifying the Ebola survivor population so as to justify the right area of study.  In this study also, the survey was important in obtaining information that would be required in describing the characteristics of a huge sample of individuals that have the same phenomenon in a relatively faster manner; the researcher were also able to formulate the monitoring program (Mengersen, Gurevitch, & Schmid, 2013). The survey enabled the researchers to identify the Ebola survivor’s households, age, and gender. It also helped to shape the formula being used in the study.

Flaws and Discrepancies

Among the discrepancies of the study is that it was not compared to findings in other regions. It is also interesting to note that the results are based on only a single test outcome, which shows what new resurgence of the Ebola virus disease was detected in semen tests but did not appear in the breast milk tests (Qureshi, 2016). This means that the reports regarding the effect of the current Ebola virus disease treatment were not established in the end. Despite the fact that the study was carried on the survivors, it would have been better if the study would have considered assessing the effectiveness of the virus treatment based on gender differences. 

Conclusion

In conclusion, the whole article has been well organized, and the information published can be used for the implementation of future Ebola programs. The article also makes good use of primary and secondary meta-analysis to describe the objective, the background, and the implementation process of the study.  In the end, the paper indicates the importance of monitoring survivors of the Ebola virus.

References

Keita, M., Keita, S., Diallo, B., Camara, M., Mesfin, S., Nebie, K. Y., … Subissi, L. (2020). Public Health Program for Decreasing Risk for Ebola Virus Disease Resurgence from Survivors of the 2013–2016 Outbreak, Guinea. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 26(2), 206-211. doi:10.3201/eid2602.191235

Mengersen, K., Gurevitch, J., & Schmid, C. H. (2013). A meta-analysis of Primary Data. Handbook of Meta-analysis in Ecology and Evolution. doi:10.23943/princeton/9780691137285.003.0018

Qureshi, A. I. (2016). Treatment of Ebola Virus Disease. Ebola Virus Disease, 159-166. doi:10.1016/b978-0-12-804230-4.00011-x