Scientists reveal new contact tracing method for sex partners of people with chlamydia

Scientists have shown the effectiveness of a world-first contact tracing method to identify, test and treat sex partners of people with chlamydia – a sexually transmitted infection (STI) that affects 250,000 people in the UK each year.

Accelerated Partner Therapy (APT) is a contact tracing method, in which healthcare professionals assess sex partners of people with chlamydia by phone before giving the patient a package of antibiotics and STI self-sampling kits to deliver to their partner.

Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) sexual health expert and NHS consultant, Professor Claudia Estcourt, who led the development of APT and the large-scale trial, said it could provide patients choice, save the NHS money and be adapted for infectious diseases like Monkeypox, COVID-19 or other STIs.

The study entitled Accelerated partner therapy contact tracing for people with chlamydia: The LUSTRUM cluster cross-over randomised controlled trial, has been published in The Lancet Public Health journal.

It was funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), a major funder of global health research and training that benefits the NHS, public health and social care.

The research also involved experts from University College London, the Universities of Brighton, Birmingham, Strathclyde, Bern in Switzerland, along with UKHSA Health Protection Services, Health Promotion and Digital Services, University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust, All East Sexual Health, Barts Health NHS Trust, The Royal London Hospital, Central & North West London NHS Foundation Trust.

Professor Estcourt said: “Contact tracing is a key part of care for people with chlamydia, the UK’s most common STI.

“It is really challenging to do well. We have developed a new process called accelerated partner therapy which makes it easier for sex partners to get tested and treated.

“In this world-first, large-scale trial of APT we show that it is safe, effective and likely to be cost-saving to the NHS. In these days of ever-increasing cost pressures, this is a real step forward in how we approach infectious diseases and sexually transmitted infections, and finding ways to help people notify and get their partners tested and treated.

“This new method could be adapted within the NHS for other STIs and infectious diseases, such as Monkeypox and COVID-19.”

Professor Estcourt said developing a new process like accelerated partner therapy is very similar to designing a new drug in terms of the stages they had to go through to demonstrate its safety and effectiveness.

She added: “We feel hugely proud because it is a really long process that takes years and we have followed the gold standard, Medical Research Council guidance, for development of complex interventions. The stages are very similar to developing a new drug:

“Since we received our first APT grant funding 2008, we have taken the process through exploratory studies, testing it out with different patient groups, different infections and finally getting to this large randomised controlled trial.

“This study been a shining example of multi-disciplinary working across clinical practice, academia, epidemiology, public health, mathematical modelling, health economics, health psychology and commissioning and health planning.

“Without that very strong multi-disciplinary working we wouldn’t have got here. I am so grateful to have led this research and to all of the authors and their institutions because the strength of this is in the team and the disciplines it draws in and the joint working.”

Professor Estcourt is a key researcher in the School of Health and Life Sciences Research Centre for Health (ReaCH) which makes a direct and significant contribution to Sustainable Development Goal 3 – good health and wellbeing – issued by the United Nations in 2015 as a blueprint for peace and prosperity across the planet.

Watch this short film for an overview of APT and the trial findings - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVLLih8XbSA

The Lancet Public Health journal has also published commentary written by world-leading researchers in Melbourne - https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpub/article/PIIS2468-2667(22)00230-4/fulltext