Olaf Mueller

..Amodiaquine is a common partner drug in different malaria combination therapies used or investigated in sub-Saharan Africa, but data on its efficacy as a single drug are scarce...

..Understanding local concepts of illness and their influence on health care-seeking behaviour can complement existing knowledge and lead to the development of more effective malaria control interventions...

..This is particularly worrying with regard to the increasing resistance development of Plasmodium falciparum against affordable anti-malarial medications, which has led to a change to more expensive drugs in most endemic countries...

..The effectiveness of ITNs is largely influenced by behavioural factors and not much is known regarding such factors under programme conditions...

..5%, 14.0%)] and 24% [95% CI (19.4%, 28.3%)], respectively. MB appears to have efficacy against malaria, but the combination of CQ-MB is clearly not effective in the treatment of malaria in Africa...

..Demographic surveillance systems (DSS) implementing the verbal autopsy (VA) method are the only possibility to observe cause-specific mortality of a population on a longitudinal basis in many countries...

..All-cause and malaria-specific mortality rates for children under-five years old in a mesoendemic malaria area (The Gambia) were compared with those from a hyper/holoendemic area (Burkina Faso)...

..Home treatment through mothers of febrile children supported by mother groups and local health workers has the potential to reduce malaria morbidity and mortality...

..Methylene blue (MB) combined with chloroquine (CQ) has been considered as one promising new regimen...

..The objectives of this study were to identify gaps in the provision of ANC services and knowledge of danger signs as well as the quality of care women receive in case of complications...

..To study the effects of zinc supplementation on malaria and other causes of morbidity in young children living in an area holoendemic for malaria in west Africa...

..The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of free ITN distribution through antenatal care services in addition to an ITN social marketing programme in an area typical for rural SSA...

..To clarify this issue, we did a randomized controlled trial to assess the long-term effects of bednet protection during early infancy...

..Intervention Supplementation with zinc (12.5 mg zinc sulphate) or placebo daily for 6 days a week for 6 months. Outcomes Weight, length/height, mid-arm circumference, and serum zinc...

..These findings provide further evidence for the justification of continued use of pyrimethamine-sulfadoxine as a second-line treatment for malaria in Burkina Faso...

..To describe the pattern of fever-associated morbidity, treatment-seeking behaviour for fever episodes, and cause-specific mortality in young children of a malaria-holoendemic area in rural Burkina Faso...

..In this community-based study, the overall treatment failure rate was 12/120 (10%), with no differences between villages. This supports the evidence for a still sufficient efficacy of chloroquine in north-western Burkina Faso...

..There is little information on the effectiveness of modern compared to traditional malaria treatment from the rural areas of Africa...

..The technology of 'long-lasting' insecticide-treatment needs much improvement...

..To achieve the hunger- and malnutrition-related Millennium Development Goals, we need to address poverty, which is clearly associated with the insecure supply of food and nutrition...

..The objective of this study was to describe young children's access to malaria treatment in Nouna Health District, Burkina Faso...

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..There is conflicting evidence on how much can be achieved under real life conditions with the current interventions in the highly endemic savannah areas of SSA...

..Future planning of malaria control interventions ought to take into consideration current inadequacies and lead to programmes better designed to overcome them...

..8% CV. After a single oral dose (500 mg) methylene blue concentrations were detectable for 72 h in plasma. The methods were applied within clinical studies to samples from healthy individuals and malaria patients from Burkina Faso...

..2% (95.8-99.6%) and the specificity was 97.1% (94.2-99.2%). In conclusion, the NFP assay is a reliable and inexpensive method for large-scale G6PD deficiency screening in rural West Africa...

..Hence it seems that the extended family system still manages to care for young orphans. Paying school fees for older children should be the primary target for HIV/AIDS impact mitigation programs in urban Uganda...

..To identify determinants of utilisation for antenatal care (ANC) and skilled attendance at birth after a substantial reduction in user fees...

..The aim of the study was to quantify the effect of risk factors for childhood mortality in a typical rural setting in sub-Saharan Africa...

..Given restricted budgets, however, free distribution programmes are unlikely to be feasible...

..Chloroquine (CQ) resistance has reached high levels in Africa in recent years. Little is known about variations of resistance between urban and rural areas...

..It is well described parametrically with a sinusoidal function. In adults, the highest all-cause mortality rates were observed in the dry season. Here, HIV/AIDS has become a leading cause of mortality...

..There was no association between PEM and malaria morbidity, but malnourished children had a more than two-fold higher risk of dying than non-malnourished children...

..Mortality in developing countries has multiple causes. Some of these causes are linked to climatic conditions that differ over the year. Data on season-specific mortality are sparse...

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..With the aim of excluding treatment failures due to low bioavailability, we have investigated the absolute bioavailability of MB given as an aqueous oral formulation and its interaction with chloroquine (CQ)...