Recent achievements in scaling up paediatric antiretroviral therapy (ART) have changed the life of children living with HIV, who now stay healthy and live longer lives. However, as it becomes more of a chronic infection, a range of new problems have begun to arise. These include the disclosure of HIV serostatus to children, adherence to ART, long-term toxicities of antiretroviral drugs and thei...

OBJECTIVE To measure the rate of wound infection after cesarean section and assess risk factors for such infection. METHODS A prospective surveillance was conducted at King Khalid University Hospital, Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, during the period January 2000 through to December 2000. This included a total of 754 cesarean sections. The following risk factors, which were studied included,...

Background The iatrogenic risk of HIV vertical transmission, calculated in initial epidemiologic studies of this infection seemed to contra-indicate the performance of invasive prenatal diagnosis (PND) techniques. The implementation of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) represented a turning point in PND management, owing to a rapid and effective reduction of the maternal viral load.

Intrauterine infections are important causes of childhood blindness in both developed and developing countries. Chorioretinal scars are the most characteristic eye manifestation of a congenital or prenatal infection. The various ocular manifestations of congenital infections, summarized by the mnemonic TORCH, and recent additions to the "other" category (lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus and W...

BACKGROUND Congenital syphilis is recognized as a substantial public health problem in Sub-Saharan Africa. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of syphilis among antenatal care attendees in Botswana and to contribute to knowledge about the challenges facing the syphilis-screening programme. METHODS In a cross-sectional study, 703 antenatal care attendees at 13 health faciliti...

A new commercial real-time human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) PCR kit was evaluated after automated DNA extraction of 153 amniotic fluids in parallel with an in-house real-time PCR assay. The commercial kit displayed 100% sensitivity/specificity compared to the "in-house" assay and was suitable for prenatal diagnosis of HCMV congenital infection.

OBJECTIVE The objective of the study was to evaluate the vertical transmission rate and fetal risk following primary maternal cytomegalovirus infection before and around conception. STUDY DESIGN Data of patients referred to fetal medicine clinic in 1 tertiary center in Israel were evaluated. Each included subject had primary maternal cytomegalovirus infection determined by serology, precise g...

BACKGROUND In Vietnam, no systematic prenatal toxoplasmosis screening is in place, and only few studies have assessed the prevalence and importance of this zoonotic parasite infection. In addition, no studies have been conducted to assess the risk factors associated with toxoplasmosis. This study protocol was developed to determine the seroprevalence of toxoplasmosis in pregnant women in Hanoi ...