The research project TREAT C-AUD Child alcohol use disorder in Eastern Uganda: screening, diagnostics, risk factors and management of children drinking alcohol in Uganda (TREAT C-AUD) is growing from infancy to toddlerhood

Two years into the project period, the TREAT C-AUD Child alcohol use disorder in Eastern Uganda: screening, diagnostics, risk factors and management of children drinking alcohol in Uganda project group can look into accomplished tasks and meaningful activities for child mental health in Uganda onwards.

Acomplished tasks
The project planned PhD-candidate exchange which for obvious reasons were cancelled during the pandemic. The Ugandan team has taken on the bulk of on-site work and maneuvered data collection in times of rapidly shifting restrictions affecting both domestic mobility, children’s daily activities and costs.

For example, as the team planned on validating the research instruments among school going children, children had to be called from school list to participate in the validation study.

On the other hand, as the team planned on working evening and weekend hours to reach school going children in a larger survey, they were found at home – or were left with other relatives during day time.

Instruments capturing ‘normal’ activities were shaped to fit the ‘unnormal’ reality which persists. Ugandan children are part of the large group of children worldwide that has had their regular school closed.

The team is worried about long term consequences as almost 200 million children worldwide having lost as much as 20 months of schooling.

Data collection and presentations up to now
Up until now, validation of the CRAFFT tool was conducted between September 2020 and March 2021 with 470 primary school age children. Preliminary findings were presented at the 24th World Congress of the International Association of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry and Allied Professions (IACAPAP).

Data collection for the community household survey commenced on the 12th of November 2020 and data cleaning is on-going. Preliminary numbers show that a total of 4648 households were visited in 99 enumeration areas. 2575 of the visited households had eligible children and 3887 children were eligible for study participation. A total of 3594 children were enrolled into the study. We collected urine samples and anthropometric measurements for each enrolled child. Data management is ongling.

Qualitative data analysis of data collected from children is ongoing and preliminary findings were presented at Abstracts of the 12th European Congress on Tropical Medicine and International Health, 28 September - 1 October 2021, Bergen, Norway.

Joyce Nalugya got an award for the oral presentation: Presented by Joyce Nalugya, Makerere University College of Health Science, Uganda and coauthors Skylstad V, Babirye J, Sentongo Semata A, Ndeezi G, Engebretsen I, Bangirana P, Nakasujja “She gives to her child who doesn’t even talk”: Children’s perceptions and experiences with alcohol use in Uganda (no 209) The abstracts can be found in the open access special issue from the European Journal of TMIH.

Also, formative work desciribing the Ugandan health system has been done.

Meaningful activities
Two years into the project period, the research team is confident that alcohol and substance use among children aged 6-13 years is worthwhile studying.

More details about the project can be found Child alcohol use disorder in Eastern Uganda: screening, diagnostics, risk factors and management of children drinking alcohol in Uganda (TREAT C-AUD): a mixed-methods research protocol, supported by a registration for observational studies: Clinicaltrials.gov 29.10.2020 (#NCT04743024).

Data collection for the health system and school study has not yet commenced, and multiple activities are planned in order to collaborate with the educational and health systems, user groups and stakeholder.