Serum and hair zinc in severely malnourished Bangladeshi children associated with or without acute lower respiratory infection.

Objective: To assess the zinc status in Bangladeshi children suffering from severe protein energy malnutrition (severe PEM), acute lower respiratory infection (ALRI), PEM presented with ALRI and to evaluate the relationship of zinc status with aforementioned clinical conditions.

Methods: We assessed zinc status by simultaneous estimation of serum and hair zinc of Bangladeshi children less than 5 yr of age suffering from severe PEM, ALRI, severe PEM presented with ALRI and compared them with zinc status of well-nourished healthy children (control) in a hospital based cross sectional four cell study. Zinc concentration was estimated by Flame atomic absorption spectrophotometry.

Cefpodoxime proxetil compared with cefixime for treatment of typhoid fever in children.

In order to evaluate clinical and bacteriological efficacy of Cefpodoxime Proxetil (CP) in typhoid fever in comparison to cefixime (CF), we assessed 140 children with suspected typhoid fever. Fulfilling inclusion criteria finally 40 culture confirmed typhoid fever were allocated in randomized double blind clinical trial (RCT) to receive therapy with either oral CP (16 mg/kg/day, n = 21) or oral CF (20 mg/kg/day, n = 19) for 10 days. The two groups were comparable in their clinical and baseline characteristics.