Enrolment and follow up procedure
anaemia, parasitaemia, malaria
ANAEMIA, BLOOD, EVENT, MALARIA
At schools selected for close monitoring, participants for effectiveness evaluation were selected at random among schoolchildren of class 1 to 6. Each class contributed 30 schoolchildren balanced by sex. Here, systematic random sampling was conducted, wherein boys and girls organized separately and a respective total number of schoolchildren (i.e. boys or girls) was divided by 15 to obtain the counting interval. A starting number was chosen from a random Excel-generated list of counting numbers (1 to 9) that was created for each school. Participants were then selected starting with an identified random number then followed by counting the interval obtained in between each new selection until the necessary number of participants, 15 per sex, had been achieved. In the event that a class had an even number of girls or boys or had less than 30 schoolchildren total, then another class with a greater number of schoolchildren would compensate for the missing ones (Additional file Additionally, for schoolchildren selected for evaluation of effectiveness of IPTsc, an informed written consent was obtained from their parent or guardian, which included an assent if a child was 11 years or older. For this evaluation, schoolchildren aged 5 to 15 years and of class one to six were eligible for enrolment. Parents, guardians and schoolchildren were informed of their right to withdraw from the study at any time. Baseline data on social demographics and well-being of schoolchildren were obtained from parents or guardians who had signed consent. At this stage, home visits were necessary for acquisition of global positioning system (GPS) satellite location data and verification of social demographic data with regard to household characteristics. Given that only a portion of schoolchildren were to be enrolled for effectiveness evaluation, the team made one school visit a day before the school parents meeting, where possible eligible children were selected at random (at least 30 children per class, extras were chosen in case a parent could not attend the meeting), and told to bring their parents to a school meeting.During the parents’ meeting, the study was explained in detail before a written informed consent was administered to those interested. If the parent or guardian of a pre-selected child missed a briefing meeting, he/she was followed up at home for briefing and consenting processes. Nonetheless, parents or guardians who had shown interest during the meeting and whose children were in the pre-defined list, were given priority to replace those who were either absent or did not show interest in the study. This was done to attain the required number of children per school, balanced by sex and class year, from whom biological benchmarks (i.e. reduction of parasitaemia and anaemia prevalence) were to be evaluated through routine testing for malaria and haemoglobin levels at four-month (a total of four visits) (Fig. IPTsc effectiveness assessment flow chart. Legend: IPTsc = intermittent preventive treatment in school-aged children; DP = dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine; Hb = Haemoglobin concentration in g/dl; BS = Blood slide; ITT = intention-to-treat analysis; PP = per-protocol analysis