Malaria, Pneumonia
Conditions
Keywords
malaria, pneumonia, Nigeria, IMCI, diagnosis
Brief summary
This research investigates the diagnostic accuracy of various diagnostic approaches for malaria and pneumonia in under-five children presenting to primary healthcare centres in Benin City, Nigeria.
Detailed description
Of the preventable and treatable diseases, both malaria and pneumonia are significant contributors to under-five mortality in Nigeria. To reduce the burden of these diseases, the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) guidelines were developed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to be used at first point of contact (e.g., primary healthcare centres) with children under the age of five years old. Preliminary literature review suggests that although interventions based on numerous diagnostic approaches have been trialed, burden from malaria and pneumonia remains unacceptably high in Nigeria, suggesting limited effectiveness of existing approaches. Therefore, this study aims to compare the accuracy of different early diagnostic approaches used in the community(for e.g. the WHO Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) guidelines versus the gold standard diagnostic tests comprising microscopy in malaria and chest radiography in pneumonia) in children under the age of five years presenting with suspected malaria and pneumonia to primary healthcare centres in Benin City, Edo State of Nigeria. The research will compare the accuracy of these various diagnostic approaches using measures such as sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and area under the receiver operating characteristic curve. The research will also assess patient outcomes like complications, hospitalisation and death following a diagnosis of either pneumonia or malaria in all study participants as well as costs associated with malaria and pneumonia.
Interventions
OTHERmalaria or pneumonia diagnosis
Diagnostic approaches for malaria (lay diagnosis, as per IMCI guidelines by trained primary healthcare workers, clinical diagnosis by medically qualified doctor, rapid diagnostic tests, Giemsa microscopy); Diagnostic approaches for pneumonia (lay diagnosis, as per IMCI guidelines by trained primary healthcare workers, clinical diagnosis by medically qualified doctor, chest x-ray)
Sponsors
University of Benin
University of Nottingham
Study design
Observational model
COHORT
Time perspective
PROSPECTIVE
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
2 Months to 4 Years
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
* Suspected malaria (symptoms reported by caregiver that are consistent with malaria: high temperature, chills and no other probable diagnosis) * Suspected pneumonia (fever, cough, shortness of breath/difficulty in breathing, with or without chills and no other probable diagnosis) * Willingness of caregiver to provide written or verbal consent in the presence of a witness.
Exclusion criteria
None
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Malaria confirmed by microscopy (yes/no) | Participants will be assessed within an average period of 24 hours of presenting to study primary healthcare centres | This is the gold standard diagnosis for malaria and will be used to assess the accuracy of other diagnostic approaches |
| Pneumonia confirmed by chest x-ray (yes/no) | Participants will be assessed within an average period of 48 hours of presenting to study primary healthcare centres | This is the gold standard test for pneumonia and will be used to assess the accuracy of other diagnostic approaches |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Hospitalisation (yes/no) | Within 30 days of first consultation | This will be assessed for all study participants with either a malaria or pneumonia diagnosis as part of an epidemiological study |
| Death (yes/no) | Within 30 days of first consultation | This will be assessed for all study participants with either a malaria or pneumonia diagnosis as part of an epidemiological study |
Countries
Nigeria
Outcome results
None listed