Malaria is an infection sustained by three parasites namely: Plasmodium falciparum, Plasmodium vivax, and Plasmodium ovale. Plasmodium falciparum is the most common and virulent parasite. These parasites are present in different areas of the sub-Saharan African countries and Asia. In 2010, there were an estimated 219 million cases of malaria resulting in 660,000 deaths and, approximately, two-t...

BACKGROUND Malaria is still a major health problem in some parts of the world. Plasmodium falciparum is the common pathogenic parasite and is responsible for majority of malaria associated deaths. Recently the other benign parasite, P. vivax, is reported to cause life threatening severe malaria complications. Thus, this study was aimed to assess incidence of severe malaria symptoms caused by P....

BACKGROUND The hypothesis is that hemoglobin-based metrics are useful tools for estimating malaria endemicity and for monitoring malaria control strategies. The aim of this study is to compare population hemoglobin mean and anemia prevalence to established indicators of malaria endemicity, including parasite rates, rates of enlarged spleens in children, and records of (presumptive) malaria diag...

Cost-effectiveness information on where malaria rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) should be introduced is limited. We developed incremental cost-effectiveness analyses with data from rural health facilities in Ghana with and without microscopy. In the latter, where diagnosis had been presumptive, the introduction of RDTs increased the proportion of patients who were correctly treated in relation to...

In areas where malaria is endemic, the appropriate management of febrile illness and the effective use of resources for malaria control rely on the availability and use of diagnostic tests.1 In the absence of diagnostic tests, antimalarial drugs are often taken for illnesses that have similar symptoms to those of malaria.2–5 Failure to diagnose malaria can lead to poor case management, a waste ...

BACKGROUND In malaria endemic areas, fever has been used as an entry point for presumptive treatment of malaria. At present, the decrease in malaria transmission in Africa implies an increase in febrile illnesses related to other causes among underfives. Moreover, it is estimated that more than half of the children presenting with fever to public clinics in Africa do not have a malaria infectio...

Aims: In much of Africa, Ghana inclusive, malaria has traditionally been diagnosed and treated presumptively: any patient with fever was presumed to have malaria and treated with antimalarial drugs. In this study, the retail pharmacies practitioners’ perspectives on the implementation of Malaria Rapid Diagnostic Tests was sought and decisions analyzed in themes, using Realist Conceptual Approac...

OBJECTIVE Rapid diagnostic tests for malaria seem cost effective in standard analyses, but these do not take account of clinicians' response to test results. This study tested the impact of clinicians' response to rapid diagnostic test or microscopy results on the costs and benefits of testing at different levels of malaria transmission and in different age groups. DESIGN Cost-benefit analysi...

BACKGROUND Artemisinin derivatives used in recently introduced combination therapies (ACTs) for Plasmodium falciparum malaria significantly lower patient infectiousness and have the potential to reduce population-level transmission of the parasite. With the increased interest in malaria elimination, understanding the impact on transmission of ACT and other antimalarial drugs with different phar...