A chest radiograph scoring system in patients with severe acute respiratory infection: a validation study.

BACKGROUND: The term severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) encompasses a heterogeneous group of respiratory illnesses. Grading the severity of SARI is currently reliant on indirect disease severity measures such as respiratory and heart rate, and the need for oxygen or intensive care. With the lungs being the primary organ system involved in SARI, chest radiographs (CXRs) are potentially useful for describing disease severity. Our objective was to develop and validate a SARI CXR severity scoring system. METHODS: We completed validation within an active SARI surveillance project, with SARI defined using the World Health Organization case definition of an acute respiratory infection with a history of fever, or measured fever of ≥ 38 °C; and cough; and with onset within the last 10 days; and requiring hospital admission. We randomly selected 250 SARI cases. Admission CXR findings were categorized as: 1 = normal; 2 = patchy atelectasis and/or hyperinflation and/or bronchial wall thickening; 3 = focal consolidation; 4 = multifocal consolidation; and 5 = diffuse alveolar changes. Initially, four radiologists scored CXRs independently. Subsequently, a pediatrician, physician, two residents, two medical students, and a research nurse independently scored CXR reports. Inter-observer reliability was determined using a weighted Kappa (κ) for comparisons between radiologists; radiologists and clinicians; and clinicians. Agreement was defined as moderate (κ > 0.4-0.6), good (κ > 0.6-0.8) and very good (κ > 0.8-1.0). RESULTS: Agreement between the two pediatric radiologists was very good (κ = 0.83, 95% CI 0.65-1.00) and between the two adult radiologists was good (κ = 0.75, 95% CI 0.57-0. 93). Agreement of the clinicians with the radiologists was moderate-to-good (pediatrician:κ = 0.65; pediatric resident:κ = 0.69; physician:κ = 0.68; resident:κ = 0.67; research nurse:κ = 0.49, medical students: κ = 0.53 and κ = 0.56). Agreement between clinicians was good-to-very good (pediatrician vs. physician:κ = 0.85; vs. pediatric resident:κ = 0.81; vs. medicine resident:κ = 0.76; vs. research nurse:κ = 0.75; vs. medical students:κ = 0.63 and 0.66). Following review of discrepant CXR report scores by clinician pairs, κ values for radiologist-clinician agreement ranged from 0.59 to 0.70 and for clinician-clinician agreement from 0.97 to 0.99. CONCLUSIONS: This five-point CXR scoring tool, suitable for use in poorly- and well-resourced settings and by clinicians of varying experience levels, reliably describes SARI severity. The resulting numerical data enables epidemiological comparisons of SARI severity between different countries and settings.

The clinical and public health problem of relapse despite primaquine therapy: case review of repeated relapses of Plasmodium vivax acquired in Papua New Guinea.

BACKGROUND: Primaquine is the only drug available for preventing relapse following a primary attack by Plasmodium vivax malaria. This drug imposes several important problems: daily dosing over two weeks; toxicity in patients with glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficiency; partner blood schizontocides possibly impacting primaquine safety and efficacy; cytochrome P-450 abnormalities impairing metabolism and therapeutic activity; and some strains of parasite may be tolerant or resistant to primaquine. There are many possible causes of repeated relapses in a patient treated with primaquine. CASE DESCRIPTION: A 56-year-old Caucasian woman from New Zealand traveled to New Ireland, Papua New Guinea for two months in 2012. One month after returning home she stopped daily doxycycline prophylaxis against malaria, and one week later she became acutely ill and hospitalized with a diagnosis of Plasmodium vivax malaria. Over the ensuing year she suffered four more attacks of vivax malaria at approximately two-months intervals despite consuming primaquine daily for 14 days after each of those attacks, except the last. Genotype of the patient's cytochrome P-450 2D6 alleles (*5/*41) corresponded with an intermediate metabolizer phenotype of predicted low activity. DISCUSSION: Multiple relapses in patients taking primaquine as prescribed present a serious clinical problem, and understanding the basis of repeated therapeutic failure is a challenging technical problem. This case highlights these issues in a single traveler, but these problems will also arise as endemic nations approach elimination of malaria transmission.

A clinical review of mpox for the Aotearoa New Zealand clinician.

The World Health Organization declared mpox (formerly monkeypox) a Public Health Emergency of International Concern in July 2022. Aotearoa New Zealand has reported cases of mpox since July, with reports of locally acquired cases since October 2022. The 2022 global mpox outbreak highlights many features of the illness not previously described, including at-risk populations, mode of transmission, atypical clinical features, and complications. It is important that all clinicians are familiar with the variety of clinical manifestations, as patients may present to different healthcare providers, and taking lessons from the HIV pandemic, that all patients are managed without stigma or discrimination. There have been numerous publications since the outbreak began. Our narrative clinical review attempts to bring together the current clinical evidence for the New Zealand clinician.

Imported malaria in Auckland, New Zealand.

AIM: To describe the current malaria situation in Auckland, New Zealand. METHOD: We collected data on all cases of malaria diagnosed in Auckland from 1st October 2008 to 30th September 2009. Enhanced surveillance was arranged with all hospital and community haematology laboratories in the region. Laboratories notified us when a diagnosis of malaria was made. After obtaining informed consent the patient was asked about their travel, prophylaxis taken and symptoms. Laboratory results were collected. RESULTS: There were 36 cases of malaria in 34 patients. Consent could not be obtained from two patients so data is from 34 cases in 32 patients. (One patient had P.falciparum then later P.vivax, the other had P.vivax and relapsed.) There were 24 males and 8 females with a median age of 21 years (range 6 months to 75 years). Eleven of the 32 were New Zealand residents. 8 of these 11 had travelled to visit friends or relatives (VFR) while 3 were missionaries. In this group 6 had P.falciparum, 4 P.vivax and one had both. Twenty-one of the 32 were new arrivals to New Zealand: 11 refugees and 10 migrants. CONCLUSION: Malaria in Auckland is seen in new arrivals and VFR travellers, not in tourist travellers.