AHRI HDSS:Individual Health Surveillance HIV 2013

The Africa Centre Demographic Information System (ACDIS) was established in 2000 by the Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI; formerly the Africa Centre for Health and Population Studies) covering a population of approximately 85,0000 residents and non-residents from an area 438km2 in size in uMkhanyakude district, KwaZulu-Natal province, South Africa.

The 2013, the “Eligibility List” for the 2013 Round of the HIV Surveillance used 15 December 2013 as its reference date. The criteria for inclusion were all males and females aged 15 and over.
Note that as in 2012, but unlike in earlier years, no non-residents are included.

The total number eligible is 37,208, so this is the number of rows in the dataset.

The field visits occur from January 2013 to Dec 2013. At the time of visit some people included in the Eligibility List were found to in fact be ineligible - perhaps because they were dead, very sick, or had outmigrated - events either not known about at the time the Eligibility List was compiled or occurring between the drawing up of the Eligibility List and the actual visit. These 'retrospective ineligibilities' are identifiable in the dataset as 'Premature Completions' with reasons such as “Death or “Outmigration”. There were also some individuals who could not be contacted, even after repeated visits and 'tracking' attempts for those who were reported to have moved. These are identifiable as PrematureCompletionReason = Non-Contact. Additionally, some people were contacted but refused to participate in the survey. They are identifiable by VisitType = Refusal. Finally, there are some who participated in the survey, but refused the HIV test offered. They are identifiable as HIVRefused = 'Y'.

2013 saw a redesign of the Individual Surveillance forms. No questions were added or removed, but the BMF form was renamed as IHO - Individual Health Observation (image below). The Informed Consent questions, formerly on the CFZ form, were incorporated into the IHO form, and some of the questions previously on the BMF form were moved to the MGH/WGH forms. Finally, Visit details and Premature Completion / refusal information is now collected just once on the IHO, not separately on both BMF and WGH/MGH.

This dataset includes only those included in the Eligibility List.

Criteria for inclusion into the Eligibility List was changed in 2012 to include only the residents and the age limit was removed for both males and females. Therefore, all resident males and females aged 15 years and above were eligible for the HIV surveillance.

Individuals were free to refuse to participate in and to withdraw from the individual surveys, without any impact on routine health care or other services to which they were entitled. If a household refused to participate in the household component, its members were not invited to participate in the individual component during that same household visit.
Note: Users of these datasets are strongly encouraged to refer to the questionnaires included in the documentation for the annual datasets to check carefully for any changes in question wording, ordering, options offered etc. This document does not attempt to describe every single change and variation.

For more refer:

1. Tanser F, Hosegood V, Bärnighausen T, Herbst K, Nyirenda M, Muhwava W, Newell C, Viljoen J, Mutevedzi T, Newell ML. Cohort Profile: Africa Centre Demographic Information System (ACDIS) and population-based HIV survey. Int J Epidemiol. 2008 Oct;37(5):956-62. doi: 10.1093/ije/dym211. Epub 2007 Nov 12. PMID: 17998242; PMCID: PMC2557060.