Advances in filarial hydrocelectomy reporting in Uganda and Nigeria

Summary

Surgery for hydrocele is part of the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended essential package of care for people affected by lymphatic filariasis (LF). In Uganda and Nigeria, the national LF programmes adopted a smartphone-based hydrocele tracker app in 2021 to monitor hydrocele operations, collecting data on surgical registration, preoperative, intraoperative, postoperative and follow-up information. Between 2021 and 2023, 2,911 patient records were analysed. This paper highlights the implications of the data for LF programming, the value of digitisation and approaches to address data quality.