Good clinical diagnostic practice: a guide for clinicians in developing countries to the clinical diagnosis of disease and to making proper use of clinical diagnostic services

Physicians in developing countries usually take a syndromic approach to diagnosing a patient. Today, we observe increasing microbial resistance to drugs, particularly in developing countries. This worsening situation puts a heavy obligation on medical professionals to improve their clinical diagnosis. Clinical diagnostic services provide more accurate information on a patient based on physical and biochemical investigations. However, in many countries there is little communication between the physicians and the laboratory and diagnostic imaging services. Occasionally, medical staff feel that diagnostic imaging and even more so laboratory services report results that are inappropriate or even erroneous. Consequently, the service provided by the laboratory is wasted, placing an unacceptable burden on the diagnostic services, which is of no benefit to the health service. This manual has been written to improve the clinical and diagnostic skills of physicians. The manual assumes that clinicians have been trained in history-taking, physical examination and use of laboratory investigations and also have access to basic clinical diagnostic equipment and to essential laboratory tests

Fluorescence microscopy for disease diagnosis and environmental monitoring

Fluorescence microscopy meets all the essential requirements for laboratory examination even under constrained conditions of work. Fluorescence microscopy has proved to be a useful and very cost-effective procedure for disease surveillance and for the diagnosis of many infectious diseases caused by bacteria, viruses or protozoa, as well as noncommunicable diseases in hospital and outpatient care. Fluorescence microscopy is almost as simple to do as bright-field microscopy, and most often it is more specific. In the past, the high cost of fluorescence microscopes has prevented the wider application of this method. More recently, less expensive fluorescence microscopes have been developed, and accessories are now available that convert a bright-field microscope into a fluorescence microscope. Laboratories should be more aware of the advantages of using fluorescence microscopy. The practical steps of indirect immunofluorescence microscopy in the diagnosis of noncommunicable diseases are also considered

[Survey of surgical and radiological semiology modules and their adaptation to the Arabic cultural environment]

Many professors of medicine oppose the Arabization of the teaching of medical science in the Maghreb countries, under pretext of the inability of Arabic to convey scientific concepts objectively compared with French. We made a qualitative survey of surgical and radiological semiology used in the Faculty of Medecine, Ibn El Jazzar. Terms, expressions and synonyms were identified and classified according to their cultural load into two categories: "culturally adapted terms" and "culturally strange terms" in relation to the national culture. It was evident that the majority of the recorded expression were based on Western culture. Thus the hypothesis of the neutrality of the French language in the medical teaching is invalid. Furthermore the use of French poses difficulties for students in underst and ing the scientific matter taught, and indirectly promotes Western culture within the medical academic establishments of the Arabic world. The use of the mother tongue in teaching medicine is today an educational necessity

[Ear, nose and throat manifestations in human immunodeficiency virus infection]

Human immunodeficiency virus [HIV] infection, which is responsible for AIDS, is one of the most widespread in the world. Its clinical manifestations are polymorphous, and are casued by the virus itself [primary lesions] or the resulting immunodepression [secondary lesions]. All the body can be affected, and the ORL organs are frequently involved. Our purpose was to describe these manifestations at all stages of the disease, and to illustrate the importance of an early diagnosis, which needs close collaboration between the clinician, the anatomopathologist and the radiologist

Quality systems for medical imaging: Guidelines for implementation and monitoring

No medical imaging service can produce high quality work unless it is properly managed. Quality management implies good organization and discipline, with complete documentation of all aspects of the imaging service. Guidelines and management rules therefore need to be established if the quality of medical imaging services is to be improved. This publication aims to cover some of the needs and demands of the medical imaging services, both in developing and developed countries. It outlines principles for appropriate medical imaging and contains guidelines as well as checklists designed to assist medical imaging centers in self-assessment of their performance