1. Health care provider practices in diagnosis and treatment of malaria in rural communities in Kisumu County, Kenya.
- Author
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Otambo, Wilfred Ouma, Olumeh, Julius O, Ochwedo, Kevin O, Magomere, Edwin O, Debrah, Isaiah, Ouma, Collins, Onyango, Patrick, Atieli, Harrysone, Mukabana, Wolfgang R, Wang, Chloe, Lee, Ming-Chieh, Githeko, Andrew K, Zhou, Guofa, Githure, John, Kazura, James, and Yan, Guiyun
- Subjects
Humans ,Malaria ,Malaria ,Falciparum ,Fever ,Antimalarials ,Diagnostic Tests ,Routine ,Sensitivity and Specificity ,Health Personnel ,Rural Population ,Kenya ,Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction ,Artemether ,Artemether ,Lumefantrine Drug Combination ,Blood smear ,Misdiagnosis ,Presumptive treatment ,Treatment guidelines ,Infectious Diseases ,Vector-Borne Diseases ,Clinical Research ,Rare Diseases ,Health Services ,4.2 Evaluation of markers and technologies ,Detection ,screening and diagnosis ,Infection ,Good Health and Well Being ,Microbiology ,Medical Microbiology ,Public Health and Health Services ,Tropical Medicine - Abstract
BackgroundAccurate malaria diagnosis and appropriate treatment at local health facilities are critical to reducing morbidity and human reservoir of infectious gametocytes. The current study assessed the accuracy of malaria diagnosis and treatment practices in three health care facilities in rural western Kenya.MethodsThe accuracy of malaria detection and treatment recommended compliance was monitored in two public and one private hospital from November 2019 through March 2020. Blood smears from febrile patients were examined by hospital laboratory technicians and re-examined by an expert microscopists thereafter subjected to real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for quality assurance. In addition, blood smears from patients diagnosed with malaria rapid diagnostic tests (RDT) and presumptively treated with anti-malarial were re-examined by an expert microscopist.ResultsA total of 1131 febrile outpatients were assessed for slide positivity (936), RDT (126) and presumptive diagnosis (69). The overall positivity rate for Plasmodium falciparum was 28% (257/936). The odds of slide positivity was higher in public hospitals, 30% (186/624, OR:1.44, 95% CI = 1.05-1.98, p
- Published
- 2022