Corneal Ulcers in a Tertiary Hospital in Northern Nigeria

Background/Objective: To highlight the pattern of corneal ulcers at the Guinness Ophthalmic Unit; Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital; Kaduna; Nigeria.Materials and Methods: A retrospective review of case notes of patients who presented with corneal ulcer at the Guinness Ophthalmic Unit; Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital between January 1995 and December 2005. Information obtained include demographic data; presenting complaints; predisposing factors; microbiological diagnosis; use of orthodox or traditional medications before presentation; duration before presentation and; presenting and final visual acuity.Results: A total of 228 cases presented within the 10 years study period. There were 129 (56.6) males and 99 (43.4) females. The age range was 15 months to 66 years. The commonest presenting complaints was poor vision 109 (47.8) followed by lacrimation 97 (42.5) and ocular pains 96 (42.1). The common predisposing factors were trauma 117 (51.3); use of traditional eye medications 39 (17.1); self medication with topical steroids 13 (5.7) and measles 9 (4.0). The presenting visual acuity was 6/60 in 49.8 of the patients; 6/18-6/60 in 23.4; and 6/6-6/18 in 25.5 of the patients. At discharge; 45.6 had a visual acuity of 6/6-6/18; 27.2 had borderline vision (6/18-6/60); 18.0 had severe visual impairment (6/60); while 6.6 had no light perception. The commonest organisms isolated were Staphylococcus aureus in 19.7; fungal hyphae in 15.8and Streptococcus pneumoniae in 4.8.Conclusion: In this study most patients with corneal ulcer presented with poor vision and excessive lacrimation. Trauma was the commonest predisposing factor with bacterial organisms as the commonest isolate

Perceptions of Nigerian Medical Specialists on Research

"The current research aimed at collating the views of medical specialists on disease priorities; class and outcomes of health research in Nigeria; and draw appropriate policy implications. Structured questionnaires were distributed to consent 90 randomly selected medical specialists practising in six Nigerian tertiary health institutions. Participants' background information; relative disease priority; research types and class; type and class of publication media; frequency of publications; challenges faced in publishing research; impact of their research on health practice or policy; and inventions made were probed. Fifty-one out of the 90 questionnaires distributed were returned giving a response rate of 63.3. Sixty-four point six percent indicated that the highest priority should be given to non communicable diseases while still recognizing that considerations should be giving to the others. They were largely ""always"" involved in simple low budget retrospective studies or cross-sectional and medical education studies (67.8) and over a third (37.5) had never been involved in clinical trials. They largely preferred to ""always"" publish in PubMed indexed journals that are foreign-based (65.0). They also indicated that their research works very rarely resulted in inventions (4) and change (4) in clinical practice or health policy. Our study respondents indicated that they were largely involved in simple low budget research works that rarely had significant impacts and outcomes. We recommend that adequate resources and research infrastructures particularly funding be made available to medical specialists in Nigeria. Both undergraduate and postgraduate medical education in Nigeria should emphasize research training in their curricula."