An oral history of medical laboratory development in francophone West African countries.

Background: Underdeveloped and underused medical laboratories in sub-Saharan Africa negatively affect the diagnosis and appropriate treatment of ailments.

Objective: We identified political, disease-related and socio-economic factors that have shaped the laboratory sector in Senegal, Mali and Burkina Faso to inform laboratory-strengthening programmes.

Methods: We searched peer-reviewed and grey literature from February 2015 to December 2018 on laboratory and health systems development from colonial times to the present and conducted in-depth interviews with 73 key informants involved in (inter)national health or laboratory policy, organisation, practice or training.

Risk factors for multidrug-resistant tuberculosis in four centers in Burkina Faso, West Africa.

This is a case-control study conducted to examine the risk factors for multidrug resistance (MDR) among patients with pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) in four centers in Burkina Faso, West Africa: Ouagadougou, Bobo-Dioulasso, Gorom-Gorom, and Dori. Fifty-six MDR-TB cases and 304 controls were enrolled of which 40 MDR-TB cases and 222 controls were from Ouagadougou. The majority of cases were male, with 39 among MDR-TB cases and 205 in controls.