The Kiang West Demographic Surveillance System (DSS)
Underpinning all of the field studies in Keneba is the demographic surveillance of the entire Kiang West region, a population of approximately 16,000 distributed among some 30 villages. As well as allowing us to monitor migration and vital statistics in these times of rapid social changes in the region, the DSS provides a sampling frame for surveys and a tracking system for longer-term longitudinal and follow-up studies.
Set up in 2004, each compound is visited every three months in order to record all births, deaths and migrations in or out. We also maintain records of parents (and hence family trees), marriages and pregnancies for the inhabitants of the region. Databases for all Keneba-based studies are linked directly to the DSS database and a reporting system for errors and discrepancies ensures that corrections are disseminated immediately to all studies.
