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Background: Hyperlactatemia is a strong predictor of mortality in severe falciparum malaria. Sequestered parasitized erythrocytes and reduced uninfected red blood cell deformability (RCD) compromise microcirculatory flow, leading to anaerobic glycolysis.Methods: In a cohort of patients with falciparum malaria hospitalized in Chittagong, Bangladesh, bulk RCD was measured using a laser diffraction technique, and parasite biomass was estimated from plasma concentrations of Plasmodium falciparum histidine-rich protein 2 (PfHRP2). A multiple linear regression model was constructed to examine their associations with plasma lactate concentrations.Results: A total of 286 patients with falciparum malaria were studied, of whom 224 had severe malaria, and 70 died. Hyperlactatemia (lactate level, ≥ 4 mmol/L) was present in 111 cases. RCD at shear stresses of 1.7 Pa and 30 Pa was reduced significantly in patients who died, compared with survivors, individuals with uncomplicated malaria, or healthy individuals (P < .05, for all comparisons). Multiple linear regression analysis showed that the plasma PfHRP2 level, parasitemia level, total bilirubin level, and RCD at a shear stress of 1.7 Pa were each independently correlated with plasma lactate concentrations (n = 278; R(2) = 0.35).Conclusions: Sequestration of parasitized red blood cells and reduced RCD both contribute to decreased microcirculatory flow in severe disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Patients' experiences in the intensive care unit (ICU) can enhance or impair their subsequent recovery. Improving patient and family experiences on the ICU is an important part of providing high quality care. There is little evidence to guide how to do this in a South Asian critical care context. This study addresses this gap by exploring the experiences of critically ill patients and their families in ICUs in Bangladesh and India. We elicit suggestions for improvements from patients, families and staff and highlight examples of practices that support person-centred care. This multi-site hospital ethnography was carried out in five ICUs in government hospitals in Bangladesh and India, selected using purposive sampling. Qualitative data were collected using non-participant observation and semi-structured interviews and analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. A total of 108 interviews were conducted with patients, families, and ICU staff. Over 1000 hours of observation were carried out across the five study sites. We identified important mediators of patient and family experience that span many different aspects of care. Factors that promote person-centred care include access to ICU for families, support for family involvement in care delivery, clear communication with patients and families, good symptom management for patients, support for rehabilitation, and measures to address the physical, environmental and financial needs of the family. This study has generated a list of recommendations that can be used by policy makers and practitioners who wish to implement person-centred principles in the ICU., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Inglis et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Background: Improved access to healthcare in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) has not equated to improved health outcomes. Absence or unsustained quality of care is partly to blame. Improving outcomes in intensive care units (ICUs) requires delivery of complex interventions by multiple specialties working in concert, and the simultaneous prevention of avoidable harms associated with the illness and the treatment interventions. Therefore, successful design and implementation of improvement interventions requires understanding of the behavioural, organisational, and external factors that determine care delivery and the likelihood of achieving sustained improvement. We aim to identify care processes that contribute to suboptimal clinical outcomes in ICUs located in LMICs and to establish barriers and enablers for improving the care processes., Methods: Using rapid evaluation methods, we will use four data collection methods: 1) registry embedded indicators to assess quality of care processes and their associated outcomes; 2) process mapping to provide a preliminary framework to understand gaps between current and desired care practices; 3) structured observations of processes of interest identified from the process mapping and; 4) focus group discussions with stakeholders to identify barriers and enablers influencing the gap between current and desired care practices. We will also collect self-assessments of readiness for quality improvement. Data collection and analysis will be led by local stakeholders, performed in parallel and through an iterative process across eight countries: Kenya, India, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan, South Africa, Uganda and Vietnam., Conclusions: The results of our study will provide essential information on where and how care processes can be improved to facilitate better quality of care to critically ill patients in LMICs; thus, reduce preventable mortality and morbidity in ICUs. Furthermore, understanding the rapid evaluation methods that will be used for this study will allow other researchers and healthcare professionals to carry out similar research in ICUs and other health services., Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed., (Copyright: © 2023 The Collaboration for Research, Implementation and Training in Critical Care in Asia and Africa (CCAA) et al.)

Background: The value of medical registries strongly depends on the quality of the data collected. This must be objectively measured before large clinical databases can be promoted for observational research, quality improvement, and clinical trials. We aimed to evaluate the quality of a multinational intensive care unit (ICU) network of registries of critically ill patients established in seven Asian low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Methods: The Critical Care Asia federated registry platform enables ICUs to collect clinical, outcome and process data for aggregate and unit-level analysis. The evaluation used the standardised criteria of the Directory of Clinical Databases (DoCDat) and a framework for data quality assurance in medical registries. Six reviewers assessed structure, coverage, reliability and validity of the ICU registry data. Case mix and process measures on patient episodes from June to December 2020 were analysed. Results: Data on 20,507 consecutive patient episodes from 97 ICUs in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan and Vietnam were included. The quality level achieved according to the ten prespecified DoCDat criteria was high (average score 3.4 out of 4) as was the structural and organizational performance -- comparable to ICU registries in high-income countries. Identified strengths were types of variables included, reliability of coding, data completeness and validation. Potential improvements included extension of national coverage, optimization of recruitment completeness validation in all centers and the use of interobserver reliability checks. Conclusions: The Critical Care Asia platform evaluates well using standardised frameworks for data quality and equally to registries in resource-rich settings., Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed., (Copyright: © 2022 Collaboration for Research, Implementation and Training in Critical Care - Asia Investigators et al.)

Background: The value of medical registries strongly depends on the quality of the data collected. This must be objectively measured before large clinical databases can be promoted for observational research, quality improvement, and clinical trials. We aimed to evaluate the quality of a multinational intensive care unit (ICU) network of registries of critically ill patients established in seven Asian low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Methods: The Critical Care Asia federated registry platform enables ICUs to collect clinical, outcome and process data for aggregate and unit-level analysis. The evaluation used the standardised criteria of the Directory of Clinical Databases (DoCDat) and a framework for data quality assurance in medical registries. Six reviewers assessed structure, coverage, reliability and validity of the ICU registry data. Case mix and process measures on patient episodes from June to December 2020 were analysed. Results: Data on 20,507 consecutive patient episodes from 97 ICUs in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan and Vietnam were included. The quality level achieved according to the ten prespecified DoCDat criteria was high (average score 3.4 out of 4) as was the structural and organizational performance -- comparable to ICU registries in high-income countries. Identified strengths were types of variables included, reliability of coding, data completeness and validation. Potential improvements included extension of national coverage, optimization of recruitment completeness validation in all centers and the use of interobserver reliability checks. Conclusions: The Critical Care Asia platform evaluates well using standardised frameworks for data quality and equally to registries in resource-rich settings., Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed., (Copyright: © 2021 Collaboration for Research, Implementation and Training in Critical Care - Asia Investigators et al.)

Introduction: Severe falciparum malaria is commonly complicated by metabolic acidosis. Together with lactic acid (LA), other previously unmeasured acids have been implicated in the pathogenesis of falciparum malaria., Methods: In this prospective study, we characterised organic acids in adults with severe falciparum malaria in India and Bangladesh. Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry was used to measure organic acids in plasma and urine. Patients were followed until recovery or death., Results: Patients with severe malaria (n=138), uncomplicated malaria (n=102), sepsis (n=32) and febrile encephalopathy (n=35) were included. Strong ion gap (mean ± SD) was elevated in severe malaria (8.2 mEq/L ± 4.5) and severe sepsis (8.6 mEq/L ± 7.7) compared with uncomplicated malaria (6.0 mEq/L ± 5.1) and encephalopathy (6.6 mEq/L ± 4.7). Compared with uncomplicated malaria, severe malaria was characterised by elevated plasma LA, hydroxyphenyllactic acid (HPLA), α-hydroxybutyric acid and β-hydroxybutyric acid (all P<0.05). In urine, concentrations of methylmalonic, ethylmalonic and α-ketoglutaric acids were also elevated. Multivariate logistic regression showed that plasma HPLA was a strong independent predictor of death (odds ratio [OR] 3.5, 95 % confidence interval [CI] 1.6-7.5, P=0.001), comparable to LA (OR 3.5, 95 % CI 1.5-7.8, P=0.003) (combined area under the receiver operating characteristic curve 0.81)., Conclusions: Newly identified acids, in addition to LA, are elevated in patients with severe malaria and are highly predictive of fatal outcome. Further characterisation of their sources and metabolic pathways is now needed.

Chittagong Medical College and Hospital (CMCH) in Chittagong, Bangladesh, and Mahidol-Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit (MORU) of Bangkok, Thailand, are partners in a highly successful and productive research collaboration that is now heading into its tenth year. It produced arguably one of the most important clinical trials in tropical medicine this decade, the South-East-Asia-Quinine-Artesuante-Malaria-Trial (SEAQUAMAT) study, and has continued to evolve and grow ever since. The collaboration has successfully completed a number of significant clinical studies which have given important new insights into the management and pathogenesis of malaria and, to date, generated 14 peer-reviewed international journal publications. With each passing year, the size of the collaboration continues to increase along with the number and complexity of research studies undertaken. It has also helped to provide valuable postgraduate training to develop clinical services and increase capacity for high quality research in Bangladesh. The partners have complementary knowledge, skills and expertise and share common goals and it is hoped that this will remain a highly successful collaboration long into the future., Competing Interests: Conflicts of interest None declared.