Secondary School Students' Orientation Toward Brain Death and Organ Donation in Southern Region of Saudi Arabia.

OBJECTIVE: To measure the awareness regarding the concepts of brain death and organ donation among secondary school students within the age range of 12-18 years in the southern region of Saudi Arabia. METHOD: In the southern region of Saudi Arabia, 10 secondary schools were randomly chosen to participate in this study for which all the tree levels of secondary schools were visited and a written questionnaire was distributed to a randomly selected student from all 3 levels. The questionnaire was filled and completed anonymously and then analyzed. RESULTS: Among the 649 students surveyed, 47.22% were aware of brain death and 53.78% did not know anything about organ donation. Further, among those who had heard about these terms, 60% had received the information from informal sources like their friends or through casual web surfing; only a few had received the information from formal sources like television and the radio. The students' understanding of concepts regarding the nature of death and the causes of brain death was, as expected, inadequate and inappropriate. The Islamic perspective on brain death and the knowledge about the Sharia ruling on organ donation was also poor. Regarding the students' knowledge about organ donation, 21.57% of the students knew that organs can be donated from a brain-dead person. 24.6% knew that only living persons can donate organs, while the rest (53.78%) were not aware about organ donation at all. CONCLUSION: The knowledge of and attitude toward brain death and organ donation are very poor among the young Saudi population, and have not evolved over a period of time. The information regarding the religious fatwas has not been transmitted to the level of the educational institutions.

Relapsing polychondritis in an elderly male.

A 65 years patient presented with left ear swelling, swelling of the nasal bridge with congestion of the eyes. Clinically there was evidence of left auricular chondritis, nasal chondritis and conjunctivitis with a history of multiple similar episodes in the past, features suggestive of relapsing polychondritis. The patient improved with oral prednisolone.

Mepacrine therapy in niclosamide resistant taeniasis.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the efficacy of mepacrine (quinacrine) in patients with niclosamide resistant Taenia saginata infection. METHODS: Eighty six cases with niclosamide resistant Taenia saginata (unresponsive to 2-8 courses of niclosamide) were treated with quinacrine (1 g) administered orally or via a nasogastric tube, and followed at 2, 4, 8 and 12 weeks for recurrence of passage of proglottids and presence of Taenia eggs in the stool examinations. Pre and post-therapy egg counts were obtained and egg viability was tested by staining with methylene blue. RESULTS: Eighty-one (94.2%) patients responded promptly with passage of the worm within 4-72 hours. The egg counts showed a drastic fall in 79 cases and a fall in viability from a median of 100% to 0% was observed. Only one patient demonstrated a relapse at 4 weeks. Gastrointestinal side effects occurred in 9 cases but were controlled easily by symptomatic therapy. CONCLUSION: We conclude that quinacrine is a safe, inexpensive, effective and generally well tolerated drug for the treatment of niclosamide resistant Taenia saginata infestations.

Haemostatic abnormalities in multidrug-resistant enteric fever.

Twenty-five consecutive patients with multidrug-resistant enteric fever were evaluated and followed for haemostatic abnormalities. Twenty-one (84%) of the patients had evidence of disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) and 12 (48%) also had evidence of associated fibrinolysis. Clinical bleeding was observed in 3 (12%) cases, and did not bear any correlation with clotting abnormalities. Protein C activity was found to be decreased in 11 of the 15 cases with DIC, and a block in its activation, as previously postulated, could not be substantiated. DIC was reversed in most cases within 8 days of the institution of specific antibiotic therapy.