The recommendations cover the level of blood pressure to start medication, what type of medicine or combination of medicines to use, the target blo...od pressure level, and how often to have follow-up checks on blood pressure. In addition, the guideline provides the basis for how physicians and other health workers can contribute to improving hypertension detection and management.
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Adolescent girls and young women (AGYW) remain disproportionately affected by HIV in Eastern and Southern Africa (ESA), with 26 per cent of new infections attributed to this population. AGYW face many personal, social and structural barriers to acce...ss, uptake and use of traditional HIV prevention methods. Oral Pre-exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) is proven to be highly effective as an additional prevention choice for reducing the risk of HIV acquisition, including for AGYW. Successful uptake and adherence to PrEP is critical in its effectiveness as an HIV prevention method, however, the current demand for PrEP by AGYW is low with suboptimal adherence.
Within the ESA region, there is currently great impetus to address these challenges and scale up PrEP for AGYW. A critical aspect of this is to leverage the learnings and evidence from implementation of how to improve the demand and quality of PrEP programming for this population. Improving the Quality of Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis Implementation for Adolescent Girls and Young Women in Eastern and Southern Africa examines the current efforts in the region to accelerate and scale up evidence-based PrEP delivery platforms. The implementation brief provides current knowledge and builds on WHO guidance to provide key considerations for implementation, including driving demand and improving quality, as well as focus on wider combination prevention and integration agendas.
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The Updated guidelines on Management of tuberculosis in children and adolescents include new recommendations that cover diagnostic approaches for TB, shorter treatment for children with non-severe drug-susceptible TB, a new option for the treatment ...of TB meningitis, the use of bedaquiline and delamanid in young children with multidrug- and rifampicin-resistant TB and decentralized and family-centred, integrated models of care for TB case detection and prevention in children and adolescents.
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The main purpose of the meeting was to review tsetse control tools, activities and their contribution to the elimination of gHAT and the monitoring thereof. Seven endemic countries provided reports ...on recent and ongoing vector control interventions at the national level (Angola, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Guinea and Uganda). Country reports focused on the in situations implementing and supporting vector control activities, the tools and the approaches in use, the coverage of the activities in space and time and their impacts on tsetse populations. Future perspectives for vector control in the respective countries were also discussed, including opportunities and challenges to sustainability.
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Conflict, climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the economic effects of the Ukraine crisis are interacting to create new and worsen existing hunger hotspots, reversing the gains families had made to escape poverty.
During the 17 years since Surgical approaches to the urogenital manifestations of lymphatic filariasis was first published, there has been heightened awareness of the physical, economic and emotiona...l burden of the genitourinary manifestations of filariasis. With the impetus to provide better guidance for care of those suffering from LF, this update was both warranted and timely.
At the outset, the Committee noted that barriers continue to exist in care of patients affected by LF-associated morbidity. These barriers include lack of information for patients as well as for many healthcare providers, including general surgeons and others within health systems
This update offers a new consensus of the Committee regarding the staging of hydroceles caused by LF, also known as “filariceles”. It recommends integrating LF surgery with other efforts to strengthen surgical care by assessing health facilities for their surgical readiness using the WHO surgical assessment tool or “SAT”. It also recommends integratinghernia surgery with hydrocele surgery and integrating standards for prevention of surgical site infection (SSI).
The update revises recommendations for standard procedures and processes, offers an algorithm for diagnosis (including the use of ultrasound) and discusses postoperative care. It recommends collecting data using the staging and grading system described by Capuano and Capuano along with other metrics for public health management of LF.
A multifaceted approach has therefore been recommended to coordinate public health outreach with national surgical planning and local health systems to include supporting partners such as nongovernmental organizations. Surgical camps with mobile teams, as well as training of personnel at DCP3 “first level” or WHO Level II hospitals (depending on region and resources), have important roles for reducing LF morbidity.
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Schistosomiasis is widely recognized as a disease that is socially determined. An understanding of the social and behavioural factors linked to disease transmission and control should play a vital role in designing policies and strategies for schist...osomiasis prevention and control. To this must be added the awareness that schistosomiasis is also a disease of poverty. It still survives in poverty-stricken, remote areas where there is little or no safe water or sanitation, and health care is scarce or non-existent. For a variety of complex reasons, many of which are addressed in this book, the disease is particularly prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa, and persists in certain areas of rural China. This concern for human behaviour in an environment of poverty echoes the concerns of the new research priority for “diseases of poverty” identified by the Special Programme for Research & Training in Tropical Diseases.
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Schistosomiasis is widely recognized as a disease that is socially determined. An
understanding of the social and behavioural factors linked to disease transmission and
control should play a vital role in designing policies and strategies for schi...stosomiasis
prevention and control. To this must be added the awareness that schistosomiasis is
also a disease of poverty. It still survives in poverty-stricken, remote areas where there
is little or no safe water or sanitation, and health care is scarce or non-existent. For
a variety of complex reasons, many of which are addressed in this book, the disease
is particularly prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa, and persists in certain areas of rural
China. This concern for human behaviour in an environment of poverty echoes the
concerns of the new research priority for “diseases of poverty” identified by the
Special Programme for Research & Training in Tropical Diseases.
more
Diets are changing everywhere, and the burden of disease associated with unhealthy diets is a worldwide concern. Measurement and monitoring of diets across countries and population groups is critica...l. However, there are no harmonized metrics for tracking how the healthfulness of diets around the world is evolving.
This report assesses the validity, usefulness and fitness for purpose of existing healthy diet metrics as global and national monitoring indicators, presents a comparative assessment of selected healthy diet metrics and discusses priorities and opportunities to improve diet monitoring. This report is an important first step of the Healthy Diets Monitoring Initiative to respond to the need for developing healthy diets metrics for assessing and monitoring diets at national and global level.
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Formularies are lists of antibiotics that are suggested for certain healthcare settings. In developing a recommended formulary, countries should consider the needs of patients and facilities where t...hey receive care. For example, clinicians in rural or primary health centers may need wide access to first-line antibiotics (e.g., penicillin, ampicillin, TMP-SMX), but last resort antibiotics such as carbapenems or colistin might be limited to tertiary care hospitals. Efforts to create antibiotic formularies may be linked to efforts within countries to create or update essential medicine lists (EML).
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Research Article
PLOS Medicine | DOI:10.1371/journal.pmed.1002253 April 4, 2017
Antibiotic stewardship refers to coordinated efforts and activities that seek to measure and improve use of antibiotics. Implementation of ASPs has demonstrated positive public health and clinical i...mpacts including reducing costs, lengths of hospital stays, and the burden of antibiotic resistance while maintaining or improving patient outcomes. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released the Core Elements of Hospital Antibiotic Stewardship Programs in 2014, which outlines essential components for ASPs in hospitals and provides practical guidance for implementing a robust ASPin an acute care facility. Variations to the Core Elements have been developed to deal with the particular challenges in small, rural or critical access hospitals in the United States and in outpatient facilities and nursing homes.
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Joule 5, 2687–2714 October 20, 2021 Cell Press
States have committed and assumed obligations to address multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination against refugees, internally displaced persons, asylum seekers, returnees and stateless persons. The Global Compact on Refugees places ending ...discrimination of any kind based on the grounds of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth, disability, age, or other status at the centre of action to prevent displacement and to ensure peaceful coexistence between refugee and host communities. Narratives about cultural diversity and inclusion are important, but there is also a pressing need in many societies for conversations and action to address racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.
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This report presents the most current data on four specific forms of violence – violent discipline and exposure to domestic abuse during early childhood; violence at school; violent deaths among adolescents; and sexual violence in childhood and ad...olescence. The statistics reveal that children experience violence across all stages of childhood, in diverse settings, and often at the hands of the trusted individuals with whom they interact daily. The report concludes with specific national actions and strategies that UNICEF has embraced to prevent and respond to violence against children.
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