Factors associated with recurrent chlamydial infection and failure to return for retesting in young women entering national job training program, 1998--2005.

Objectives: To evaluate factors associated with recurrent chlamydial infection and failure to return for retesting in socioeconomically disadvantaged women (aged 16-24 years) entering the National Job Training Program, 1998--2005.

Goal: To evaluate sociodemographic characteristics of young women associated with recurrent chlamydial infection.

Study Design: We computed chlamydia prevalence at initial visit and recurrent infection (defined as a positive chlamydia test 1-2 months after completing treatment) and percent of infected women who were retested by sociodemographic variables.

Results: At entrance, women had a high prevalence of chlamydia infection (10.7%). Chlamydia prevalence varied by age, race/ethnicity, and place of residence (South, Midwest, Northeast, and West), year of test, and type of test. Among women infected at initial visit, younger aged women (16-17 years), blacks and Hispanics, those who resided in the South and Midwest, and those tested in 1998--2000 were less likely to be retested. Of the 13,550 infected women, 5,892 (43.5%) were retested. Of those retested, 332 (5.6%) had recurrent infection 1-2 months after completing treatment. Although chlamydia prevalence at retesting did not differ significantly by sociodemographic characteristics, the pattern of the prevalence was similar to the pattern at the initial test. Multivariate logistic regression analyses showed similar findings.

Conclusions: The high prevalence of recurrent infection in these women may be due to reinfection and/or treatment failure. The findings of this analysis underscore the need for retesting infected women regardless of their demographic characteristics.