This course has expanded our knowledge on the causation and effects of numerous diseases that impact the field of epidemiology. A disease that deserves utmost attention is Chlamydia as it severely affects women. This case study is enabling us to explore the effectiveness and efficiency of tests that may be used to curb the problem of this sexually transmitted disease. Chlamydia is very prevalent globally and it is feared by many and yet still there are so many unreported cases of the disease. According to research from the CDC, Chlamydia is a common STD that affects both men and women and can cause serious damage to the reproductive system of women and furthermore lead to potentially fatal ectopic pregnancy presenting a problem for women who …show more content…
A false positive deserves serious attention. There is stigma associated with obtaining the STD and CDC requires this to be reported as well as the sexual partners deserve a right to be alerted. This itself can cause further issues in the case that one sexual partner has it and the other doesn’t then one is led to think about possible infidelity. It is a very embarrassing yet anxious period when a person awaits the results of Chlamydia testing especially when the result is a false positive. The prevalence of Chlamydia in women is 25% and 7% in men which shows that it is three times higher in females. In the case of a false positive, individuals will get a scare and once individuals get tested, the information derived would be valuable as the positive predictive value helps individuals to find out the probability of the population of the population of interest that gets the disease. This will help medical personnel stop the disease in its tracks. Therefore, point of care testing was developed to allow for more accurate testing of persons: “Point of care testing allows patient diagnoses in the physician’s office, the hospital or the home and the results are timely and allow rapid treatment of the patient” (NIH, 2013). It will encourage patients to get tested and prevent any fear associated with getting tested due to the stigmas associated with attaining the infection and the history of false positives noted in the