Syphilis rates decline
Local outreach program heightens awareness and provides protection

By Jim Tiffin
Staff Writer

GALLUP — Following a surge of syphilis during the past two years, the trend has now started to decline, says Roseanne Brown, disease prevention specialist supervisor for the Department of Health's public health office here.

Sally Vink, RN, director of nursing services for the Northwest New Mexico, based in the public health office in Gallup, says for a while some babies were born with congenital syphilis; so the department decided to begin an outreach program.

"We decide to start going to areas that we knew people would not be seeking health services or testing and certainly not treatment for sexually transmitted diseases," she says.

As soon as testing began in Gallup, Grants and Farmington, in areas where the homeless and transients were know to frequent, the number of people showing the disease jumped.

"What we didn't know about the increase was whether it was because we were doing better surveillance or were just picking up more of the cases," she says.

The outreach began three years ago, but has not been continued after last fall because there has been a decrease of about 20 percent in the last couple of months, Brown says.

One of the ways the department helps control the spread of STDs is the so-called "brown bags," that are offered to any adult who asks. The bags contain free condoms.

"When we went to these areas to test people, we did their blood tests and treated them on the spot," Brown says.

Nurses accompanied health department workers in a mobile field testing unit brought in from Albuquerque and gave those who tested positive antibiotics.

The testing and treatments seem to have made an impact, Brown says, because of the decrease that is now under way.

While people were being tested for STDs, they were also tested for HIV, and some of those tested were found to have the virus as well.

"We went to jails, bars and on the streets to find these people," Vink says.

Some people being tested at the health department are now showing positive results for tuberculosis, Vink says.

TB is a bacterial infection that is dangerously communicable and is spread through contact.

Those who test positive, even though it might be a latent or dormant TB, are given a multiple antibiotic regimen to combat and cure the problem, she says.

The health department has been working with Indian Health Service on the reservation in testing and treatment. Some do not wish to travel and some don't have a way to travel, she says.

In Grants, Lou Mazon, RN, the public health nurse, says testing for STDs is not done at the request of the public but is client based.

"In other words, if a person is in one of our clinics, like family planning, and they tell us that their history involves something that we think they should be tested for, we test them," she says.

HIV testing is free, anonymous and available at all public health departments in the state, including Gallup and Grants.

Any person who wants testing just has to ask to see the nurse and does not have to give a name or reason.

Tetanus immunizations are also given free at public health departments. An adult needs a tetanus shot every 10 years, especially if they have had a puncture wound, Mazon says.

About five to 10 people ask for testing for HIV and STDs in Grants every week, she says.

— To contact reporter Jim Tiffin call 287-2197 or e-mail: jtiffin@blackmesa-isp.net.