Urine dipstick as a screening test for urinary tract infection.

Background: Febrile illnesses are common among children in Ghana and are often diagnosed as malaria, thus overlooking urinary tract infection (UTI) as a possible cause of fever.

Aims: To determine the prevalence of UTI among febrile children <5 years and to estimate the sensitivity, specificity and positive and negative predictive values of urine dipstick as a screening test.

Methods: From March to July 2004, children aged 3-60 months attending an outpatient clinic at Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Kumasi were systematically screened for UTI using Combi 10 dipstick (CyBow TM).

Exercise-induced bronchospasm and atopy in Ghana: two surveys ten years apart.

Background: Asthma and allergic diseases have increased in the developed countries. It is important to determine whether the same trends are occurring in the developing countries in Africa. We aimed to determine the time trend in the prevalence of exercise-induced bronchospasm (EIB) and atopic sensitisation over a ten-year period in Ghanaian schoolchildren.

Unseen blindness, unheard deafness, and unrecorded death and disability: congenital rubella in Kumasi, Ghana.

Objectives: Although rubella serosusceptibility among women of reproductive age in West Africa ranges from 10% to 30%, congenital rubella syndrome has not been reported. In Ghana, rubella immunization and serologic testing are unavailable. Our objectives were to identify congenital rubella syndrome cases, ascertain rubella antibody seroprevalence during pregnancy, and recommend strategies for congenital rubella syndrome surveillance.

Glucose and lactate kinetics in children with severe malaria.

Children with severe malaria often present with lactic acidosis and hypoglycemia. Although both complications independently predict mortality, mechanisms underlying their development are poorly understood. To study these metabolic derangements we sequentially allocated 21 children with falciparum malaria and capillary lactate concentrations of 5 mmol/L or more to receive either quinine or artesunate as antimalarial therapy, and dichloroacetate or saline placebo for lactic acidosis.

Five-year review of diarrheal disease cases admitted to a busy referral hospital in Ghana.

Aim: To evaluate successes in the clinical management of severe diarrheal diseases in a busy referral hospital in Ghana, four years after the introduction of the World Health Organization's protocol for the clinical management of diarrhea and the establishment of an oral rehydration therapy Corner.

Method: Data on the cases of diarrheal diseases recorded in the hospital from 1992 to 1996 were collected and analyzed.

Results: The average overall diarrheal disease mortality over the period was around 20% with twice as much deaths among adults than among children.