The Week of July 6th: IHME Abstract
Monday: On Monday we had our first weekly check in to discuss the IHME data and composing the data abstracts. We were instructed to have data abstract presentations and excel sheets finished by Friday for the team to send to IHME to look over before submitting them to multiple Hepatitis-related conferences for publication.
Area VII: 7.6: 7.6.11
Area I: 1.2: 1.2.5; 1.2.6. 1.3: 1.3.1; 1.3.6
Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday: The data took a lot of sorting and cleaning to review the indicators we decided upon for the abstracts. By the end of the week these were the key points we, as a team, chose to focus on after reviewing the trends for both the HCV data and HBV data. The final due date to submit the abstracts is July 17th, next Friday. I also participated in the weekly CVE meeting which includes program directors from the different Task Force Programs. Each program checks in to discuss what they are currently working on and the status of remote work with corona.
Area VII: 7.6: 7.6.11
Area I: 1.2: 1.2.5; 1.2.6. 1.3: 1.3.1; 1.3.6
Friday: On Friday I cleaned up my final indicators to work with my supervisor to create a presentation to send to IHME. The final things we decided upon after reviewing the data are:
- Global total deaths in 2019, % change in global total deaths 1990-2019, 2015-2019
- Top 20 countries for death rate in 2019
- Top 20 countries for total deaths in 2019
- Represent X% of global deaths
- Trends for top 20 countries 2015-2019, 1990-2019
- X number of countries have reached 2020 WHO mortality target of >10% decline
- For absolute and/or mortality rate [aggregated]
- For HCV: highlight a few countries
Our conclusions:
- A number of countries have begun to achieve substantial declines in hepatitis mortality, represented by reaching interim WHO target [OR NOT if HCV]
- To reach global elimination goals, top 20 countries will require testing and treatment to reduce mortality
Area VII: 7.6: 7.6.11
Area I: 1.2: 1.2.5; 1.2.6. 1.3: 1.3.1; 1.3.6
The Week of July 13th:
Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday/Friday: This whole week was dedicated to perfecting our abstracts to submit to AASLD. We sent around several drafts within the team and to the IHME data contributors. There was a lot of editing and reviewing that was done to ensure the abstracts met all the criteria. I also started to gather and edit bios for 2020 Elimination Champion Winners. These will be announced on World Hepatitis Day in late July. Completing the abstract was a huge relief and something I enjoyed doing.
Here is the introduction to the abstract I completed, stating the objective of the research:
In 2016, WHO set hepatitis elimination targets to reduce HCV-related deaths by at least 10% in 2020 and by 65% by 2030. The objective of this analysis was to estimate trends in country level HCV-related deaths and mortality rate from 1990-2014 and 2015-2019 to monitor progress towards elimination.
Area VII: 7.4: 7.4.5; 7.4.8 7.6: 7.6.11