Performance of Syphilis Sentinel Surveillance in the context of endemic Treponematoses: experience from Ghana

BMC Infectious Diseases

Table 3 Summary of 2007 HIV Sentinel Survey (HSS) syphilis test results and results of samples selected for retesting

Categories of HSS results	DS+/TPHA+	DS−/TPHA⁰	DS+/TPHA−	DS+/TPHA⁰	^aDS⁰/TPHA+	Total
Number of all HSS samples	1,097	17,041	135	62	31	18,366
Number of selected samples	1,001	1,118	59	36	0	2,214
Number of RPR+/TPHA+ cases	158	42	0	3	0	203
Estimated number of active syphilis cases	173.15	640.18	0	5.17	NS	818.50

DS Determine syphilis TP, TPHA Treponema pallidum haemagglutination assay, RPR Rapid plasma reagin, TPHA⁰ − TPHA result not available, DS⁰ DS result not available, NS samples not selected for retesting, ^aDS⁰/TPHA+ samples (n = 31) were excluded from the final analysis. Therefore, denominator for the overall estimate was (18,366–31) =18,335
Note: Only DS+/TPHA+ samples were regarded as “syphilis” seropositive samples (more accurately, treponemal seropositives) during the sentinel survey; all other samples were considered to be negative

ISSN: 1471-2334