Individuals within each health center or CBO are randomly selected into treatment groups over several cohorts. Throughout the program, survivors were screened by nurses and psychosocial assistants and allocated to three categories: eligible for the program but in urgent need of treatment (these individuals received immediate support); other individuals eligible for the program; and non-eligible individuals. Eligibility criteria included being a woman aged 18 or above, screened by a professional, and diagnosed with PTSD disorder. Although being a survivor of conflict-related violence was not an eligibility condition, the intervention was designed to address the mental health needs of women survivors of sexual violence.
In every cohort, the eligible individuals for the program were assigned to three groups: (i) treatment group that contains six individuals who receives NET, (ii) control group that contains six individuals who had received non-NET psychosocial support in the interim and would receive NET at least 15 months later (after endline data collection), and (iii) waiting list that contains eligible individuals who were not part of the baseline survey at this stage, but three months later, for the next cohort, were entered again into the pool of eligible individuals to be randomized.
The stratification variables used in the randomization are respondent’s treatment cohort and counselor’s id who delivered the treatment to the respondent.
