Mortality Surveillance
HIV associated Mortality Surveillance begun implementation in Zambia in 2020. HIV Mortality surveillance utilizes Verbal Autopsy (VA) a method of determining the likely cause of death by interviewing the deceased’s next of kin or caregivers. The VA utilizes the standardized WHO Verbal Autopsy questionnaire to collect details on medical history, symptoms, and the circumstances leading to death. The gathered information is then analyzed using an algorithm to determine the likely cause of death.
The Zambian implementation of HIV Mortality surveillance started by utilizing the 2016 VA tool.
Objectives
Mortality surveillance through Verbal Autopsy aims to do the following:
- Describe the cause of death at community or population level where medical certification of deaths is not available.
- Strengthen Civil registration and Vital Statistics (CRVS) by systems by providing information on non-medically certified community deaths.
- Strengthen evidence-based health policies and plans by providing critical health data.
Data Sources and Systems
- Kobo Collect: The Kobo Collect mobile application is used on tablets to collect the VA data using the WHO VA form.
- Kobo Toolbox: Aggregates and stores the collected VA data.
- VA Explorer: The VA Explorer is a VA data management and analysis system which processes the VA data and assigns Cause of Death (CoD) by running the InterVA5 CoD algorithm. It also provides data Visualization and analysis dashboard with geography, demographics, trends.