Transactions of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene
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Trans. R. Soc. Trop. Med. Hyg. · Mar 2005
Case ReportsStrongyloidiasis: a mistaken diagnosis and a fatal outcome in a patient with diarrhoea.
A patient who died in the UK from Strongyloides infection, which he had contracted in the West Indies, is described. The diagnosis was not suspected initially because he had not been forthcoming about his origins. The infection was more severe because the patient was also infected with the human T cell leukaemia/lymphoma virus type 1 (HTLV-1) and this may explain why the infection with Strongyloides was fatal. The features of the case are outlined to help other clinicians faced with such a patient.
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Trans. R. Soc. Trop. Med. Hyg. · Jan 2005
Case ReportsTreatment of acute vivax malaria with tafenoquine.
Tafenoquine is an 8-aminoquiniline related to primaquine with pre-clinical activity against a range of malaria species. We treated two acute cases of vivax malaria with tafenoquine (800 mg over three days) alone, instead of conventional chloroquine (1500 mg over three days) and primaquine (420 mg over 14 days). In addition to the convenience of this regimen, the rapid parasite clearances observed, coupled with a good clinical response and lack of recrudescence or relapse, indicate that further investigation of tafenoquine in the treatment of vivax malaria is warranted.
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Sporadic cases of acute diarrhoea with high morbidity occur commonly in rural areas of northeast India, throughout the year. At times they take epidemic form and one such outbreak occurred with attack and case fatality rates of 11.6% and 0.8%, respectively, in October 2002, in a remote locality of Assam. Vibrio cholerae O1 El Tor Ogawa was isolated in 63% of hospitalized acute diarrhoea patients. Ineffective antibacterial treatment, poor hygiene practices and bad peridomestic sanitation were the factors associated with the persistence and spread of the pathogen, leading to the outbreak of cholera, resistant to commonly-used antimicrobials.
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Trans. R. Soc. Trop. Med. Hyg. · May 2004
Historical ArticlePlague: the dreadful visitation occupying the human mind for centuries.
Plague is one of mankind's greatest scourges, which has swept away millions of people over the centuries. The first available record of the occurrence of this calamity, in humans, is from the Bible, in 1000 bc, in the city of Ashdod. The first definitely identified pandemic originated in Egypt in ad 542 (the Justinian Plague) and is estimated to have caused 100 million deaths. ⋯ Since the discovery of the causative agent in 1894, there have been remarkable advancements in immunoprophylaxis and chemoprophylaxis. However, the disease is still active in Africa, in Asia and in Americas and has been classified as a currently re-emerging disease. A 'Plague-free World' will probably remain a dream for an indefinite period.