background in islamic countries alcohol consumption is considered as against religious values. therefore, estimation of frequency of alcohol consumptions using direct methods is prone to different biases. in this study, we indirectly estimated the frequency of alcohol use in iran, in network of a representative sample using network scale up (nsu) method.   methods in a national survey, about 40...

Background In Islamic countries alcohol consumption is considered as against religious values. Therefore, estimation of frequency of alcohol consumptions using direct methods is prone to different biases. In this study, we indirectly estimated the frequency of alcohol use in Iran, in network of a representative sample using network scale up (NSU) method.   Methods In a national survey, about 40...

background: more than a billion people have some form of disabilities worldwide. persons living with a disability have many needs (including physically, mentally, and socially needs). estimating the size of disabled population is a challenge in health systems. an innovative indirect method to estimate the size of populations is network scale up (nsu) having widely used for hidden populations. t...

Background: Estimation of the size of hidden and hard-to-reach sub-populations, such as drug-abusers, is a very important but difficult task. Network scale up (NSU) is one of the indirect size estimation techniques, which relies on the frequency of people belonging to a sub-population of interest among the social network of a random sample of the general population. In this study, we estimated ...

BACKGROUND More than a billion people have some form of disabilities worldwide. Persons living with a disability have many needs (including physically, mentally, and socially needs). Estimating the size of disabled population is a challenge in health systems. An innovative indirect method to estimate the size of populations is network scale up (NSU) having widely used for hidden populations. Th...

BACKGROUND Estimation of the size of hidden and hard-to-reach sub-populations, suchas drug-abusers, is a very important but difficult task. Network scale up(NSU) is one of the indirect size estimation techniques, which relies onthe frequency of people belonging to a sub-population of interest amongthe social network of a random sample of the general population. In thisstudy, we estimated the so...

conclusions lower estimations in the nsu method might be due to the transmission barrier, which means that students were not fully aware of the high-risk behaviors of their close friends. nonetheless, it seems that these risky behaviors were more or less common among iranian college students. results the estimated prevalence using the cm and nsu were alcohol consumption (16.8% vs. 8.1%), opium ...

background abortions are of major public health concern in developing countries. in settings in which abortion is highly prohibited, the direct interview is not a reliable method to estimate the abortion rate. the indirect estimation methods to measure the rate of abortion might overcome this dilemma; they are practical methods to estimate the size of the hidden group who do not agree to partic...

Background: Network Scale-up (NSU) method is an indirect method for the estimation of hidden behaviors. In NSU, respondents are asked about the number of members they know from a subpopulation of interest (e.g., injecting drug user) and assume that the prevalence of risky behavior in the networks of a random sample of respondents is similar to that of the population. However, first, we need to ...

INTRODUCTION The results of the network scale-up (NSU) method in estimating the size of key populations for HIV might be biased if the recruited subjects are not fully informed of the risky behaviors of people in their networks (low visibility), or key populations have a smaller social network (low popularity). We aimed to measure such biases in the size estimation of people who inject drugs (P...