Outcomes of Traditional and Enhanced Gonorrhea Partner Services in the Strengthening the US Response to Resistant Gonorrhea Project, 2017 to 2019

Abstract

Introduction:The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention implemented Strengthening the US Response to Resistant Gonorrhea (SURRG) to build local detection and response capacity and evaluate responses to antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea outbreaks, including partner services for gonorrhea. We evaluated outcomes of traditional partner services conducted under SURRG, which involved (1) counseling index patients and eliciting sexual partners; (2) interviewing, testing, and treating partners; and (3) providing partner services to partners newly diagnosed with gonorrhea. We also evaluated outcomes of enhanced partner services, which additionally involved interviewing and testing partners of persons who tested negative, and social contacts of index patients and partners. Methods:We analyzed partner services investigation data from 8 jurisdictions participating in SURRG from 2017 to 2019. We summed total index patients, partners from traditional partner services, and partners and contacts from enhanced partner services, and calculated partner services outcomes among partners and contacts. We also visualized sexual networks from partner services data.Results: Of 1242 index patients identified, 506 named at least 1 sexual partner. Traditional partner services yielded 1088 sexual partners, and 105 were newly diagnosed with gonorrhea. Enhanced partner services yielded an additional 59 sexual partners and 52 social contacts. Of those partners and contacts, 3 were newly diagnosed with gonorrhea. Network visualization revealed sparse networks with few complex partnership clusters. Conclusions:Traditional partner services for gonorrhea may be useful for eliciting, notifying, and diagnosing partners of index patients in an outbreak setting. Enhanced partner services are unlikely to be effective for eliciting, notifying, and diagnosing a substantial number of additional people.

Strengthening the US Response to Resistant Gonorrhea: An Overview of a Multisite Program to Enhance Local Response Capacity for Antibiotic-Resistant Neisseria gonorrhoeae

“…Through partner services activities with sexual and social partners of index cases and with subsequently contacted partners of partners, SURRG sites identified 83 individuals with gonorrhea whose infections had not been previously diagnosed. 21…”

Exploring and Comparing the Structure of Sexual Networks Affected by Neisseria gonorrhoeae Using Sexual Partner Services Investigation and Genomic Data

“…As part of enhanced investigations for SURRG, regardless of the sexual partner's NG status, their partners (i.e., partners of partners) were also contacted and referred for testing. Investigations continued until 2 generations of sexual partners of an index case tested negative for gonorrhea 12,13 (Supplementary Material Fig. S1, http://links.…”

“…Further details on the partner services investigation networks are presented elsewhere. 13 In our study, we refer to these as the partner services investigation networks. Partner services investigation data were available for 2017 to 2019.…”

New Evidence for Antimicrobial-Resistant Gonorrhea Control Programs: Lessons Learned from the SURRG Project

“…Although very few underwent culture, all 25 had a SURRG Alert case. 12 The take-away is that traditional partner services with first-generation partners work to identify additional GC cases with elevated MICs. However, this analysis highlights 2 of the major difficulties with partner services: only half of the IPs provided at least one named contact, and DIS could only contact 66% of those.…”

“…Taken together, these 2 articles suggest that we should continue traditional partner services for persons with AMR GC as means to control transmission of a resistant infection. 12,13 However, we will continue to need to work on getting named partners to contact them and bring them to treatment. Given a scenario about receiving calls from various community providers regarding 3 potential GC treatment failures within weeks, the public health officials needed to think through the steps of what and how they would address the outbreak.…”