(P414) Compliance with syphilis treatment and follow-up in a retrospective cohort in south Brazil

Background: Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection whose had has presented increasing prevalence’s in Brazil and worldwide. Ensure treatment compliance it is a key strategy to block the transmission chain. So, we aimed to identify factors associated with lack of adherence to treatment and monitoring of the disease.



Methods: We retrospectively evaluated a cohort of 2,442 participants from the 2,530 patients included in the Information System of Compulsory Notifiable Diseases of the Municipality of Porto Alegre. An interview on sociodemographic and behavioral factors associated with the diagnosis, treatment and monitoring of syphilis was applied by trained interviewers through phone calls. The main outcomes were completeness of treatment in one month and performing the treponemic test in three, six, nine and twelve months. Descriptive analysis and multiple logistic regression were performed.



Results: From the participants included in the study, 790 were able to be contacted by phone (32.4%%) and 336 agreed in participate in the research (13.8%). The major causes for not participation were unsuccessful phone contact (67.6%), refusals (8.5%) and losses during interview (4.4%). The majority of the participants (45.4%) were from social class C. In the fully adjusted multivariate model, the social class C was associated to higher rates of treatment completeness (p=0.018). Participants with lower education level (p=0.020) and fixed-line phones had lower probability of been contacted with success (p=0.017).



Conclusion: Follow-up of notifications by telephone did not prove to be a good method to syphilis treatment monitoring, due to the high rate of lack of contact. Syphilis remains an important public health issue and effective strategies of control and follow up should be evaluated.