Chasing spirits: Clarifying the spirit child phenomenon and infanticide in Northern Ghana.

In the Kassena-Nankana District of Ghana, researchers and health interventionists describe a phenomenon wherein some children are subject to infanticide because they are regarded as spirit children sent "from the bush" to cause misfortune and destroy the family. This phenomenon remains largely misunderstood and misrepresented. Based upon both ethnographic research and verbal autopsy data from 2006 to 2007 and 2009, this paper clarifies the characteristics of and circumstances surrounding the spirit child phenomenon, the role it plays within community understandings of childhood illness and mortality, and the variations present within the discourse and practice.

"If he gives in, he will be gone...": the influence of work and place on experiences, reactions and self-care of heart failure in rural Canada.

Improving chronic disease management and outcomes is vital. However, greater understanding is needed of how aspects of context influence experiences and reactions to chronic disease and self-care. This is exemplified in relation to heart failure (HF), a common and severe chronic form of heart disease.

Patient and informal caregivers' knowledge of heart failure: necessary but insufficient for effective self-care.

Aims: Self-care of heart failure (HF) is a process that is important, complex, and challenging. Little is understood of the contextual factors influencing self-care. We aimed to examine the individual and contextual factors perceived by patients and their informal caregivers' to influence their willingness and capacity to undertake effective HF self-care.

The potential of nursing to reduce the burden of heart failure in rural Canada: what strategies should nurses prioritize?

Chronic heart failure (CHF) is an increasingly common condition in high-income countries that has a large and negative impact on life quality and expectancy, and is associated with high financial costs. In Canada, CHF has an especially large impact on rural settings because of the higher proportion of older adults (aged >65 years) in these settings, and because care and outcomes tend to be more adverse in rural parts of the country compared to urban settings. Much can be done to reduce these burdens in terms of pharmacological, behavioural and health service strategies.

Safety, tolerability, and antibody responses in humans after sequential immunization with a PfCSP DNA vaccine followed by the recombinant protein vaccine RTS,S/AS02A.

Optimal protection against malaria may require induction of high levels of protective antibody and CD8(+) and CD4(+) T cell responses. In humans, malaria DNA vaccines elicit CD8(+) cytotoxic T cells (CTL) and IFNgamma responses as measured by short-term (ex vivo) ELISPOT assays, and recombinant proteins elicit antibodies and excellent T cell responses, but no CD8(+) CTL or CD8(+) IFNgamma-producing cells as measured by ex vivo ELISPOT. Priming with DNA and boosting with recombinant pox virus elicits much better T cell responses than DNA alone, but not antibody responses.

Safety, tolerability, and lack of antibody responses after administration of a PfCSP DNA malaria vaccine via needle or needle-free jet injection, and comparison of intramuscular and combination intramuscular/intradermal routes.

Introduction of a new vaccine requires choosing a delivery system that provides safe administration and the desired level of immunogenicity. The safety, tolerability, and immunogenicity of three monthly 2.5-mg doses of a PfCSP DNA vaccine were evaluated in healthy volunteers as administered intramuscularly (IM) by needle, IM by jet injection (Biojector or IM/intradermally (ID) by jet injection.