The investigators propose to develop a behavioral intervention aimed at public health workers who perform contact investigation and designed to enhance the contact investigation process. The project will be based on social learning theory and will be conducted in several phases. First, a process evaluation of the current contact investigation process will be conducted. Results will guide the development of a revised contact investigation protocol, a software program for notebook computers designed to enhance protocol implementation, and a behavioral intervention to educate contact investigators in the use of the protocol and software. A formative evaluation of the intervention, protocol, and software will be used to refine the procedures, which will be implemented throughout the State of Alabama. An impact evaluation will then be conducted to assess the effectiveness of the procedures. If the impact evaluation results are satisfactory, the behavioral intervention and contact investigation procedures will be developed in a format that can be exported to other areas and settings.
| Gerald, L B; Bruce, F; Brooks, C M et al. (2003) Standardizing contact investigation protocols. Int J Tuberc Lung Dis 7:S369-74 |
| Bailey, William C; Gerald, Lynn B; Kimerling, Michael E et al. (2002) Predictive model to identify positive tuberculosis skin test results during contact investigations. JAMA 287:996-1002 |
