Optimal Screening Interval for a Person Vulnerable to Venereal Disease

This paper considers a person having regular dangerous sexual contacts. To be able to discover the possible infection of venereal disease, it needs to be screened regularly. We assume that its duration of exposure to dangerous sexual contacts is fixed and the optimal screening interval needs to be decided to minimize the total cost. The total cost consists of three parts: 1) the cost for the screening 2) the cost associated with curing the person if it is infected 3) the cost associated with the people infected by the person. The total cost model is constructed by analyzing all possible scenarios of the person. Numerical example is shown to illustrate the application.