ABSTRACT
A hospital based study was conducted in the anti-rabies clinic of a medical college of Orissa during April 1988 to May 2002. Of 24 clinically diagnosed and reported rabies cases during the four years study period, 62.5% were children below 15 years of age, 67% were males, 87.5% were victims of stray dogs, 79% had not taken any anti-rabies treatment though all had undergone treatment by traditional systems of medicine.
Subject(s)
Adolescent , Ambulatory Care Facilities/statistics & numerical data , Animals , Bites and Stings/complications , Child , Dogs , Drug Utilization , Female , Health Education , Hospitals, Teaching , Humans , India/epidemiology , Male , Medicine, Traditional , Rabies/epidemiology , Rabies Vaccines/therapeutic use , Socioeconomic Factors , Zoonoses/epidemiologyABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate efficacy of alpha;beta arteether in patients of P. falciparum malaria presenting with complications was undertaken in a multicentric clinical trial. METHOD: Each patient who consented to undergo clinical trial with parenteral Arteether was treated with a fixed dose schedule of Arteether given intramuscularly in a dose of 150 mg once a day on three consecutive days. Every patient was followed upto 28 days with clinical, haematological and parasitological monitoring every day upto one week and thereafter at 14, 21 and 28 days. The response was assessed in terms of fever clearance time, parasite clearance time, cure rate and parasite reappearance rate. RESULTS: A total of 211 patients of P. falciparum malaria were included in the study from four centres (Bhilai, Guwahati, Jamshedpur and Rourkela). Results of this study showed that fever clearance time ranged between 24-168 hours, parasite clearance time ranged between 24-120 hours and overall mortality ranged between 4-8.5%. Out of 211, only 14 patients expired during the study, of these, 10 patients expired within first two days i.e. before completing the three day schedule of arteether therapy. Tolerability to arteether injection was good in all these patients and no untoward effects were experienced or reported during the study. Overall cure rate observed in these studies was 93%. CONCLUSION: This study shows a rapid parasite and fever clearance in patients of complicated P. falciparum malaria.
Subject(s)
Adolescent , Adult , Animals , Antimalarials/adverse effects , Artemisinins , Female , Humans , Malaria, Falciparum/drug therapy , Male , Middle Aged , Plasmodium falciparum/drug effects , Prospective Studies , Sesquiterpenes/adverse effectsABSTRACT
To determine the incidence of hypoglycaemia in children suffering from severe falciparum malaria, 23 patients from Rourkela (Orissa), were investigated. Plasma glucose and immunoreactive insulin were estimated before and at hourly intervals during quinine infusion. No child had hypoglycaemia at the time of admission. Correlation between parasite count and prequinine plasma glucose was not significant. In the period of quinine infusion, 20 patients showed fall in plasma glucose during all the three hours (P less than 0.05, P less than 0.01, P less than 0.01 at the end of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd h respectively) but the decrease to hypoglycaemic level (plasma glucose less than or equal to 40 mg/dl) was observed in only one child. Concomitant increase in plasma insulin was noticed in 18 of these patients. Decrease in plasma glucose and increase in plasma insulin was found to correlate well (r-0.78, P less than 0.001). Hypoglycaemia was found to be an infrequent complication of severe falciparum malaria in children from the area studied. Though decrease in plasma glucose was observed after quinine infusion, it was less severe and did not reach the hypoglycaemic level.