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VA Cooperative Studies Program (CSP)

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CSP #488: Prevalence of HCV among Veterans (Veteran Serum & Plasma Repository)

 

Investigator Access

What's Available
  • Participant contact information: Names and contact information of participants who agreed to be contacted for further research, with potential for linkage to research data. (SAS, Stata, SPSS, Excel, CSV, and text file formats)
  • Research data: Individual participant data collected during the study, after deidentification. (SAS, Stata, SPSS, Excel, CSV, and text file formats)
  • Biospecimens: Blood samples from a subset of participants. Samples are de-identified or coded, as appropriate

Available Documentation

Data dictionary (PDF format) 

Dates Data are Available

Currently available, no end date 

Access Criteria

Qualified VA and non-VA investigators working for nonprofit, academic, and research centers are invited to submit a Research Resource Request form to the Project Manager at SeattleCSPEC@va.gov. All requests are reviewed for scientific and ethical merit. Access is contingent upon approval by an Institutional Review Board (IRB) and, if applicable, a VA Research and Development (R&D) Committee.  

Requestors must be fully compliant with VA data security, privacy and human subjects requirements. This may involve implementation of data access agreements (e.g., data use agreement).  Allowable analyses include those designed to achieve the aims in the approved proposal.

Study Characteristics

Objectives
  • To estimate the prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) in a representative national sample of Veterans who use Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) health care
  • To determine associations between HCV and military and nonmilitary exposures

Era of Service

All

Population

Male and female Veterans who received healthcare at 20 randomly selected VA facilities in the United States

Study Design

Cross-sectional population-based with two-staged cluster sampling

Time Period

1998 - 2000

Setting

National

N

1,288

Response Rate

33.3% 

Recruitment Method

Twenty VA medical centers were randomly selected from 145 facilities with approved research programs. 200 Veterans were randomly selected from each of the 20 facilities. Mailed invitations were sent to the selected Veterans with follow-up by the study team.

Compensation

$20

Data Collected
  • Patient demographics,
  • Diagnoses (e.g., HIV, Hepatitis B, cirrhosis),
  • Treatments,
  • Health care use
  • Military- and nonmilitary-related exposures such as exposure to blood in combat,
  • Alcohol use,
  • Injection drug use,
  • Incarceration,
  • Tattoos, 
  • Sexual behaviors
  • Seroprevalence of HCV (tested via blood samples)

Data Collection Methods
  • In-person, self-administered questionnaire
  • Followed by phlebotomy, usually done at the home or worksite

Funding Source

VA Cooperative Studies Program (CSP)

Investigator

Jason Dominitz, MD, MHS

Contact

SeattleCSPEC@va.gov

Selected Publication

Dominitz, JA, Boyko, EJ, Koepsell, TD, Heagerty PJ, Maynard C, Sporleder JL. Elevated Prevalence of Hepatitis C Infection in Users of United States Veterans Medical Centers. Hepatology. 2005;41(1):88-96.

More Information

Study website
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