Introduction Research indicates that stroke can be most effectively managed in defined units with a multidisciplinary team of specialist personnel. 1 Such resources are limited in low and middle income countries, where the rate and burden of stroke is increasing most rapidly. 2 This imbalance has resulted in calls to develop more stroke units 3 , and include local or traditional services within...

The Asian tsunami, of December 2004, caused widespread loss of life. A series of surveys were conducted to assess tsunami-related mortality and injury, risk factors, care seeking and injury outcomes. Three surveys of tsunami-affected populations, in seven districts of Aceh province, were conducted between March and August 2005. Surveys employed a two-stage cluster design and probability proport...

Editor’s introduction: Permanente in Banda Aceh! When I was providing care for tsunami survivors in a village in northern Indonesia in January 2005, I encountered patients with life-threatening P. falciparum malaria. (A 14-year-old had expired the day before we arrived.) For that reason, I went into the city of Banda Aceh to acquire antimalarial medicines. I was directed to the office of Malari...

PROBLEM After the Indian Ocean tsunami in December 2004, the International Organization for Migration constructed temporary health clinics to provide medical services to survivors living in temporary accommodation centres throughout Aceh, Indonesia. Limited resources, inadequate supervision, staff turnover and lack of a health information system made it challenging to provide quality primary he...

The Sumatra-Andanaman tsunami was one of the greatest natural disasters in recorded human history. Here, we show that on the northwest coast of Aceh, Indonesia, where the tsunami was most ferocious, the damage to corals, although occasionally spectacular, was surprisingly limited. We detected no change in shallow coral assemblages between March 2003 and March 2005, with the exception of one sit...

After more than 20 years of sporadic separatist insurgency, the Free Aceh Movement and the Indonesian government signed an internationally brokered peace agreement in August 2005, just eight months after the Indian Ocean tsunami devastated Aceh's coastal communities. This article presents a medical humanitarian case study based on ethnographic data I collected while working for a large aid agen...

CONTEXT Drug donations to developing countries may be part of medical relief operations in acute emergencies, development aid in non-emergency situations, or a corporate donations programme. After a number of documented inappropriate drug donations, the World Health Organization developed the 'Guidelines for Drug Donations', with the second and final version published in 1999. OBJECTIVES We r...

The use of spatial information in Aceh post-tsunami was driven by local practitioners and NGOs working on recovery projects, supported by the Spatial Information & Mapping Centre (SIM-Centre) based at the Bureau of Reconstruction & Rehabilitation (BRR). Initially directed to supporting recovery activities, the focus later turned to building capacity within local government agencies. A strategy ...

the acehnese mahseer, locally known as keureling, tor tambra is one of the highest economically valued freshwater fishes found in aceh waters. the culture of t. tambra was initiated in aceh province, indonesia more than five years ago. however, the growth rate in captivity has been low, probably due to feeding problems. hence, the objective of the present study was to evaluate the optimum level...

BACKGROUND There exists little agreement on the choice of indicators to be used to assess the impact of humanitarian assistance. The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami led to significant mortality and displacement in Aceh Province, Indonesia, as well as a nearly unprecedented humanitarian response. Six years after the disaster we conducted an impact assessment of humanitarian services rendered in Aceh u...