| 1. |
- Boström, Stéphanie, 1985-, et al.
(författare)
-
Biomarkers of Plasmodium falciparum infection during pregnancy in women living in Northeastern Tanzania
- 2012
-
Ingår i: PLOS ONE. - : Public Library of Science (PLoS). - 1932-6203. ; 7:11, s. e48763-
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In pregnant women, Plasmodium falciparum infections are an important cause of maternal morbidity as well as fetal and neonatal mortality. Erythrocytes infected by these malaria-causing parasites accumulate through adhesive interactions in placental intervillous spaces, thus evading detection in peripheral blood smears. Sequestered infected erythrocytes induce inflammation, offering the possibility of detecting inflammatory mediators in peripheral blood that could act as biomarkers of placental infection. In a longitudinal, prospective study in Tanzania, we quantified a range of different cytokines, chemokines and angiogenic factors in peripheral plasma samples, taken on multiple sequential occasions during pregnancy up to and including delivery, from P. falciparum-infected women and matched uninfected controls. The results show that during healthy, uninfected pregnancies the levels of most of the panel of molecules we measured were largely unchanged except at delivery. In women with P. falciparum, however, both comparative and longitudinal assessments consistently showed that the levels of IL-10 and IP-10 increased significantly whilst that of RANTES decreased significantly, regardless of gestational age at the time the infection was detected. ROC curve analysis indicated that a combination of increased IL-10 and IP-10 levels and decreased RANTES levels might be predictive of P. falciparum infections. In conclusion, our data suggest that host biomarkers in peripheral blood may represent useful diagnostic markers of P. falciparum infection during pregnancy, but placental histology results would need to be included to verify these findings.
|
|
| 2. |
- Minja, Daniel T. R., et al.
(författare)
-
Reliability of rapid diagnostic tests in diagnosing pregnancy associated malaria in North Eastern Tanzania
- 2012
-
Ingår i: Malaria Journal. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1475-2875 .- 1475-2875. ; 11, s. 211-
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Accurate diagnosis and prompt treatment of pregnancy-associated malaria (PAM) are key aspects in averting adverse pregnancy outcomes. Microscopy is the gold standard in malaria diagnosis, but it has limited detection and availability. When used appropriately, rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) could be an ideal diagnostic complement to microscopy, due to their ease of use and adequate sensitivity in detecting even sub-microscopic infections. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is even more sensitive, but it is mainly used for research purposes. The accuracy and reliability of RDTs in diagnosing PAM was evaluated using microscopy and PCR. Methods: A cohort of pregnant women in north-eastern Tanzania was followed throughout pregnancy for detection of plasmodial infection using venous and placental blood samples evaluated by histidine rich protein 2 (HRP-2) and parasite lactate dehydrogenase (pLDH) based RDTs (Parascreen (TM)) or HRP-2 only (Paracheck Pf (R) and ParaHIT (R) f), microscopy and nested Plasmodium species diagnostic PCR. Results: From a cohort of 924 pregnant women who completed the follow up, complete RDT and microscopy data was available for 5,555 blood samples and of these 442 samples were analysed by PCR. Of the 5,555 blood samples, 49 ((proportion and 95% confidence interval) 0.9% [0.7 - 1.1]) samples were positive by microscopy and 91 (1.6% [1.3-2.0]) by RDT. Forty-six (50.5% [40.5 - 60.6]) and 45 (49.5% [39.4 - 59.5]) of the RDT positive samples were positive and negative by microscopy, respectively, whereas nineteen (42.2% [29.0 - 56.7]) of the microscopy negative, but RDT positive, samples were positive by PCR. Three (0.05% [0.02 - 0.2]) samples were positive by microscopy but negative by RDT. 351 of the 5,461 samples negative by both RDT and microscopy were tested by PCR and found negative. There was no statistically significant difference between the performances of the different RDTs. Conclusions: Microscopy underestimated the real burden of malaria during pregnancy and RDTs performed better than microscopy in diagnosing PAM. In areas where intermittent preventive treatment during pregnancy may be abandoned due to low and decreasing malaria risk and instead replaced with active case management, screening with RDT is likely to identify most infections in pregnant women and out-performs microscopy as a diagnostic tool.
|
|
| 3. |
- Schmiegelow, Christentze, et al.
(författare)
-
Factors associated with and causes of perinatal mortality in northeastern Tanzania
- 2012
-
Ingår i: Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica. - : Wiley. - 0001-6349 .- 1600-0412. ; 91:9, s. 1061-1068
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Objective. To identify factors associated with perinatal mortality in northeastern Tanzania. Design. Prospective cohort study. Setting. Northeastern Tanzania. Population. 872 mothers and their newborns. Methods. Pregnant women were screened for factors possibly associated with perinatal mortality, including preeclampsia, small-for-gestational age, preterm delivery, anemia, and health-seeking behavior. Fetal growth was monitored using ultrasound. Finally, the specific causes of the perinatal deaths were evaluated. Main outcome measure. Perinatal mortality. Results. Forty-six deaths occurred. Key factors associated with perinatal mortality were preterm delivery (adjusted odds ratio (OR) 14.47, 95% confidence interval (CI) 3.2364.86, p < 0.001), small-for-gestational age (adjusted OR 3.54, 95%CI 1.1810.61, p = 0.02), and maternal anemia (adjusted OR 10.34, 95%CI 1.8956.52, p = 0.007). Adherence to the antenatal care program (adjusted OR 0.027, 95%CI 0.0030.26, p = 0.002) protected against perinatal mortality. The cause of death in 43% of cases was attributed to complications related to labor and specifically to intrapartum asphyxia (30%) and neonatal infection (13%). Among the remaining deaths, 27% (7/26) were attributed to preeclampsia and 23% (6/26) to small-for-gestational age. Of these, 54% (14/26) were preterm. Conclusions. Preeclampsia, small-for-gestational age and preterm delivery were key risk factors and causes of perinatal mortality in this area of Tanzania. Maternal anemia was also strongly associated with perinatal mortality. Furthermore, asphyxia accounted for a large proportion of the perinatal deaths. Interventions should target the prevention and handling of these conditions in order to reduce perinatal mortality.
|
|
