Building a Simple Model to Assess the Impact of Case Investigation and Contact Tracing for Sexually Transmitted Diseases: Lessons From COVID-19

François M Castonguay; Harrell W Chesson; Seonghye Jeon; Gabriel Rainisch; Leah S Fischer; Biswha B Adhikari; Emily B Kahn; Bradford Greening Jr; Thomas L Gift; Martin I Meltzer

doi:10.1016/j.focus.2023.100147

Building a Simple Model to Assess the Impact of Case Investigation and Contact Tracing for Sexually Transmitted Diseases: Lessons From COVID-19

AJPM Focus. 2023 Sep 25;3(1):100147. doi: 10.1016/j.focus.2023.100147. eCollection 2024 Feb.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Health Economics and Modeling Unit, Division of Preparedness and Emerging Infections, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia.
² Department of Health Management, Evaluation and Policy, School of Public Health, University of Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada.
³ Centre for Public Health Research (CReSP), Montréal, Québec, Canada.
⁴ National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, Division of STD Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia.

Abstract

Introduction: During the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention developed a simple spreadsheet-based tool to help state and local public health officials assess the performance and impact of COVID-19 case investigation and contact tracing in their jurisdiction. The applicability and feasibility of building such a tool for sexually transmitted diseases were assessed.

Methods: The key epidemiologic differences between sexually transmitted diseases and respiratory diseases (e.g., mixing patterns, incubation period, duration of infection, and the availability of treatment) were identified, and their implications for modeling case investigation and contact tracing impact with a simple spreadsheet tool were remarked on. Existing features of the COVID-19 tool that are applicable for evaluating the impact of case investigation and contact tracing for sexually transmitted diseases were also identified.

Results: Our findings offer recommendations for the future development of a spreadsheet-based modeling tool for evaluating the impact of sexually transmitted disease case investigation and contact tracing efforts. Generally, we advocate for simplifying sexually transmitted disease-specific complexities and performing sensitivity analyses to assess uncertainty. The authors also acknowledge that more complex modeling approaches might be required but note that it is possible that a sexually transmitted disease case investigation and contact tracing tool could incorporate features from more complex models while maintaining a user-friendly interface.

Conclusions: A sexually transmitted disease case investigation and contact tracing tool could benefit from the incorporation of key features of the COVID-19 model, namely its user-friendly interface. The inherent differences between sexually transmitted diseases and respiratory viruses should not be seen as a limitation to the development of such tool.

Keywords: Sexually transmitted diseases; case investigation; cases averted; contact tracing and partner notification; modeling.