School-Based Sexually Transmitted Disease Screening: Review and Programmatic Guidance

Abstract

School-based sexually transmitted disease (STD) screening (SBSS) was designed to provide chlamydia and gonorrhea testing, treatment, and counseling to adolescents in a school setting to overcome some of the difficulties of screening in this population. To inform STD control programs and other entities on decision making about potentially implementing this intervention, we reviewed existing published and gray literature on SBSS from 1998 to 2014. Although they are work-intensive to establish, school-based STD screening programs are a feasible and cost-effective way of testing large numbers of male and female adolescents for chlamydia and gonorrhea, and to provide counseling and treatment to almost all those who are found infected. School-based STD screening programs do not seem to reduce prevalence in either the school or the general adolescent population, although there are currently relatively few studies on large-scale SBSS. More research in this field is needed.