Dermatophyte Infections In Primary School Children In Kibera Slums Of Nairobi

Objective: To determine the prevalence and aetiology of dermatophyte infections in relation to social economic factors in primary school children in Kibera.Design: A Cross- sectional descriptive study.Setting: City council sponsored schools namely Olympic, Kibera, Ayany and Mbagathi way all in Kibera, the largest of the informal settlement within Nairobi which is home to between 700,000 - 1,000,000 inhabitamts. The study was conducted between September 2006 and February 2007.Subjects: A total of 422 primary school children from the ages of five years to 15 years were selected for the study.Results: The prevalence of dermatophytoses was 11.2% with tinea capitis being the most common type while the grey patch form being the dominant clinical manifestation. There was a significant difference (p=0.001) in dermatophytoses in different schools with Olympic primary school registering the highest prevalence (22.6%). The highestinfection rate occurred among six to eight years age bracket in both sexes compared to other age brackets (p=0.002). The genera of fungi associated with dermatophytoses were isolated indicating the number in each species as follows; T. violecium (35), T. mentagrophytes(3), T. terestre(3), T. schoenleinii(2), and T. interdigitale(1), M. canis(2),M. equinum(1) and E. flocossum(1). T. violecium was the predominant species isolated, at 35/48(71%) followed by T. mentagrophytes and T. terrestre at 3/48 (6%) each. Conclusion: The study indicates high prevalence of 11.2% dermatophyte infection among the school children in Kibera. Factors contributing to the high frequency and chronic occurrences of ring worm in this area may include poor living environment, children interaction patterns and poor health seeking behaviour. There is need for health education and public awareness campaigns among the communities in urban informal settlements on healthy seeking behaviors and hygiene in order to reducetransmission and severe clinical manifestations

Declining syphilis prevalence in pregnant women in Nairobi since 1995: another success story in the STD field?

Untreated maternal syphilis during pregnancy will cause adverse pregnancy outcomes in more than 60% of the infected women. In Nairobi, Kenya, the prevalence of syphilis in pregnant women of 2.9% in 1989, showed a rise to 6.5% in 1993, parallel to an increase of HIV-1 prevalence rates. Since the early 1990s, decentralized STD/HIV prevention and control programmes, including a specific syphilis control programme, were developed in the public health facilities of Nairobi. Since 1992 the prevalence of syphilis in pregnant women has been monitored. This paper reports the findings of 81,311 pregnant women between 1994 and 1997. A total of 4244 women (5.3%) tested positive with prevalence rates of 7.2% (95% CI: 6.7–7.7) in 1994, 7.3% (95% CI: 6.9–7.7) in 1995, 4.5% (95% CI: 4.3–4.8) in 1996 and 3.8% (95% CI: 3.6–4.0) in 1997. In conclusion, a marked decline in syphilis seroprevalence in pregnant women in Nairobi was observed since 1995–96 (P \u3c 0.0001, Chi-square test for trend) in contrast to upward trends reported between 1990 and 1994–95 in the same population