Global Health Education: International Collaboration at ICDDR,B

The purpose of this commentary is to provide an overview of the growing interest in global health education at ICDDR,B and to review examples of how this has grown from public-health research and education to include clinical education (medical and nursing) as well. This parallels the growth of the institution, with an increased focus on educational linkages within and beyond Bangladesh and the rise in interest in global health at western medical schools. Specific collaborations, their setup and structure are described. This is presented as a model for other centres of excellence in developing countries to engage their partners in the South and North on matters of education and research for mutual cooperation and benefit

Typhus Fever: An Overlooked Diagnosis

A case of typhus fever is presented. On admission, the clinical diagnosis was typhoid fever. Forty-eight hours after admission, the presence of subconjunctival haemorrhage, malena, and jaundice raised the possibility of a different aetiology, the two most likely differentials being dengue and typhus. Finally, a co-infection of typhoid and typhus was discovered. This uncommon clinical scenario should be taken into account in the management of patients with high fever on admission being treated as a case of typhoid fever

Occult Pneumonia: An Unusual but Perilous Entity Presenting with Severe Malnutrition and Dehydrating Diarrhoea

A three-month old boy was admitted to the Dhaka Hospital of the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR,B), Dhaka, Bangladesh, with the problems of acute watery diarrhoea with some dehydration and suspected dyseletrolytaemia, severe malnutrition, and reduced activity. Occult pneumonia was added to the problem list after demonstration of radiologic consolidation in right upper lung, despite the lack of clinical signs, both on admission and after correction of dehydration. The problem list was further expanded to include bacteraemia due to Staphylococcus aureus when the blood culture report was available. Severely-malnourished children may not exhibit typical clinical signs of pneumonia, and the possibility of existence of such problems should be remembered in the assessment and provision of care to hospitalized young children with severe malnutrition

Extending Prayer Marks as a Sign of Worsening Chronic Disease

A 60-year old Muslim man was admitted to the Dhaka Hospital of ICDDR,B with an exacerbation of his chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Incidental hyperpigmented skin lesions were noticed overlying the dorsum of his ankles, knees, and elbows. Such asymptomatic areas of thickened, lichenified and hyperpigmented skin are called ‘prayer marks’ and are well-imprinted on the knees, ankles, and forehead. These are secondary to prolonged periods of pressure over bony prominences during prayer. The patient's wife stated that the appearance of the elbow marks had coincided with an increase in his breathlessness and subsequent use of his elbows to rise from daily prayers. Prayer marks extending to the elbows could be a sign of worsening chronic disease

Disseminated Histoplasmosis in a Patient with Advanced HIV Disease—Lessons Learnt from Bangladesh

Histoplasmosis is a systemic fungal disease, also known as Darling's disease, caused by the dimorphic fungus Histoplasma capsulatum. It is usually self-limiting or localized in immunecompetent individuals whereas in patients with acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), it occurs in the disseminated form in 95% of cases. Although histoplasmosis predominates in the Americas (United States and Latin America, including Brazil) as an important infection among AIDS patients, it is not common in Bangladesh. In contrast, tuberculosis is extremely common in Bangladesh, with an estimated prevalence of 387 per 100,000 people. Here, a confirmed case of disseminated histoplasmosis is reported in Bangladesh in a known HIV-positive patient, which was initially suspected to be extrapulmonary tuberculosis

Perturbation Theory of the Cosmological Log-Density Field

The matter density field exhibits a nearly lognormal probability density distribution (PDF) after entering into the nonlinear regime. Recently, it has been shown that the shape of the power spectrum of a logarithmically transformed density field is very close to the linear density power spectrum, motivating an analytic study of it. In this paper, we develop cosmological perturbation theory for the power spectrum of this field. Our formalism is developed in the context of renormalized perturbation theory, which helps to regulate the convergence behavior of the perturbation series, and of the Taylor- series expansion we use of the logarithmic mapping. This approach allows us to handle the critical issue of density smoothing in a straightforward way. We also compare our perturbative results with simulation measurements.Comment: Minor clarifications to match version accepted in ApJ. 15 pages, 10 figure

Salmonella Typhi and Plasmodium falciparum Co-infection in a 12-year Old Girl with Haemoglobin E Trait from a Non-malarious Area in Bangladesh

A 12-year old girl from Uttar Badda, Dhaka, Bangladesh, was admitted to the Dhaka Hospital of ICDDR,B, with a 23-day history of fever and diarrhoea. After admission, she was treated for culture-proven Salmonella Typhi-associated infection and was discovered to be heterozygous for haemoglobin E. Despite treatment with appropriate antibiotics, the patient's condition did not improve, prompting further investigation, which revealed malaria due to Plasmodium falciparum. Dhaka is considered a malaria-free zone, and the patient denied recent travel outside Dhaka. Subsequently, the patient recovered fully on antimalarial therapy

Recurrent Sclerema in a Young Infant Presenting with Severe Sepsis and Severe Pneumonia: An Uncommon but Extremely Life-threatening Condition

A one month and twenty-five days old baby girl with problems of acute watery diarrhoea, severe dehydration, severe malnutrition, and reduced activity was admitted to the gastrointestinal unit of Dhaka Hospital of icddr,b. The differentials included dehydration, dyselectrolytaemia and severe sepsis. She was treated following the protocolized management guidelines of the hospital. However, within the next 24 hours, the patient deteriorated with additional problems of severe sepsis, severe pneumonia, hypoxaemia, ileus, and sclerema. She was transferred to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). In the ICU, she was managed with oxygen supplementation, intravenous antibiotics, intravenous fluid, including a number of blood transfusions, vitamins, minerals, and diet. One month prior to this admission, she had been admitted to the ICU also with sclerema, septic shock, and urinary tract infection due to Escherichia coli and was discharged after full recovery. On both the occasions, she required repeated blood transfusions and aggressive antibiotic therapy in addition to appropriate fluid therapy and oxygen supplementation. She fully recovered from severe sepsis, severe malnutrition, ileus, sclerema, and pneumonia, both clinically and radiologically and was discharged two weeks after admission. Consecutive episodes of sclerema, resulting in two successive hospitalizations in a severely-malnourished young septic infant, have never been reported. However, this was managed successfully with blood transfusion, broad-spectrum antibiotics, and correction of electrolyte imbalance