Preventing tuberculosis in rural South Africa using clinic systems improvements
Official title: SAIA-TB: Using the Systems Analysis and Improvement Approach (SAIA) to prevent TB in rural South Africa
Funded at Boston College · NIH-11503467 · Data updated 2026-11-12
A clinic-based systems approach aims to improve tuberculosis prevention, diagnosis, and treatment for people in rural South Africa, especially household contacts and those living with HIV.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | Boston College NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Chestnut Hill, United States) |
| Project start | May 12, 2023 |
| Project end | February 29, 2028 |
| Funding year | 2026 |
| Award (this year) | $14,645 |
| NIH project number | 3R01NR020866-04S2 |
| Project ID | NIH-11503467 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Ideal participants are people who receive care at participating rural South African clinics, especially household contacts of TB patients and people living with HIV.
✕Less likely to help
People who live outside the linked rural clinic areas, do not attend participating clinics, or have no exposure to TB patients are unlikely to benefit directly from this project.
What this research studies
As a patient, this project helps clinics use a step-by-step systems method (SAIA) to find problems in how TB care is delivered and fix them. Clinics will combine tools like workflow mapping, data review, and targeted home visits to screen household contacts and people living with HIV for TB and link them to treatment or prevention. The team builds on earlier pilots where they screened household contacts and improved parts of the care cascade. The project measures whether these clinic-level changes lead to more people being diagnosed, starting treatment, and completing prevention.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, more people could be diagnosed earlier, start and complete TB treatment, and fewer people would develop or spread TB.
How similar studies have gone: SAIA has improved HIV care cascades and prior pilots of SAIA for TB and contact screening showed promise, but larger-scale effectiveness in rural South Africa is still being tested.
Where this research is happening
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Boston College
Chestnut Hill, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Van de Water, Brittney Jayne — Boston College
- Study coordinator: Van de Water, Brittney Jayne
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.