Physicians Not Following Guidelines For STD Screening, QuantiaMD Finds

Main Category: Sexual Health / STDs
Also Included In: Women's Health / Gynecology
Article Date: 31 Oct 2008 - 2:00 PDT

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When it comes to sexually transmitted diseases, doctors may not be giving women the screening tests they need, QuantiaMD finds. According to a national survey of infectious disease physicians within the online medical community QuantiaMD, a full 42% of responders said they did not think it necessary to do yearly chlamydia screening for sexually active women under the age of 25.

Screening for this group of women has been recognized as a key measure for preventing pelvic inflammatory disease, and yearly testing has been recommended by the CDC, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, and other medical entities for almost a decade.

"These data tell me we in public health need to do a better job of educating our colleagues in clinical medicine about screening recommendations," states Jeffrey Klausner, MD, MPH, Director of STD Prevention at the San Francisco Department of Public Health and investigator of the QuantiaMD survey.

The majority of clinicians also failed to recognize the need for follow-up testing in patients already diagnosed with chlamydia or gonorrhea: Only 38% reported that they routinely gave additional testing after 3 months. Klausner says repeat tests are pivotal to ruling out further infections and to "help prevent the continued spread of disease."

Increased STD knowledge among clinicians greatly needed

STD tracking by the CDC shows chlamydia to be the most commonly reported infectious disease in the United States today. It is estimated that approximately 2.8 million new cases of chlamydia occur each year, the majority of these in women. When undiagnosed and untreated, chlamydia can lead to serious health and reproductive problems including pelvic inflammatory disease, infertility, and potentially fatal ectopic pregnancies.

The need for further education and increased awareness among clinicians is clear, and figuring out new ways to approach and solve the problem is an ongoing challenge. Klausner and others hope that QuantiaMD may be part of the solution, "Using QuantiaMD proved very easy to obtain important data from physicians to inform national STD control activities and policy," he says. The ability to then communicate with and educate physicians through QuantiaMD is even more powerful, he adds.

A total of 432 infectious disease clinicians participated in this survey. The results from the study are available at: http://quantiamd.com/player/ktmakaf?r=1&u=kpr

QuantiaMD is an online clinician community improving the quality and safety of healthcare by clinicians participating in world-class education, interactive cases, field research and patient discussions using breakthrough mobile and web technology.

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