ABSTRACT
Background: The objective of this study is to determine the success rate of oral methotrexate in Hospital Shah Alam for the past 2 years.Methods: This is a cross-sectional study using secondary data obtained from medical record office in Hospital Shah Alam on patients with ectopic pregnancy. A total of 35 patients who fulfilled the criteria for medical management were selected. They were prescribed with oral methotrexate with the dose of 60 mg given in 3 divided doses every 2 hours using the standard tablet of 2.5mg. Follow up was done at day 4, day 7 and till HCG level achieve less than 20 iu/litre.Results: 29 patients were successfully treated with oral methotrexate 60 mg (82.8%). Another 6 patients had to undergo laparoscopic surgery with confirmed leaking, ruptured tubal pregnancy. 4 patients needed second dose of Methotrexate due to rising HCG level and all of them were successfully treated after the second dose. The side effects of oral methotrexate were tolerated well by all patients. There are numbers of predictors for success which are the level of HCG <4000 iu/litre, size of mass <4cm, no abdominal pain during early presentation and decrease of HCG level in between day 4 to day 7 after oral methotrexate.Conclusions: The success rate of oral methotrexate for stable ectopic pregnancy is good making it a suitable option for clinical settings which has no specialised equipment to handle cytotoxic drugs.
ABSTRACT
Cryptosporidium, a protozoan parasite, can cause cryptosporidiosis which is a gastrointestinal disease that can infect humans and livestock. Cattle are the most common livestock that can be infected with this protozoan. This study was carried out to determine the prevalence of Cryptosporidium infection in cattle in Kuantan, Pahang, Malaysia and to find out the association between the occurrence of infection and 3 different ages of cattle (calves less than 1 year, yearling, and adult cattle). The samples were processed by using formol-ether concentration technique and stained by modified Ziehl Neelsen. The results showed that 15.9% (24/151) of cattle were positive for Cryptosporidium oocysts. The occurrence of Cryptosporidium in calves less than 1 year was the highest with the percentage of 20.0% (11/55) followed by yearling and adult cattle, with the percentage occurrence of 15.6 % (7/45) and 11.8% (6/51), respectively. There was no significant association between the occurrence and age of cattle and presence of diarrhea. Good management practices and proper hygiene management must be taken in order to reduce the infection. It is highly important to control the infection since infected cattle may serve as potential reservoirs of the infection to other animals and humans, especially animal handlers.