The Prevalence of Malaria in Outpatients Attending Dangila Health Center, North Central Ethiopia
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Date
2017-08
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Malaria is one of the leading causes of illness and death in Ethiopia. Over the past years, the disease has been reported as the first leading cause of outpatient visits, hospitalization and death in health facilities across the country. Regardless of decades of sustained control efforts, malaria still remains as the major cause of morbidity, mortality and socio-economic problems in Ethiopia because malaria control is a big challenge due to many factors. Ethiopia developed a five-year National Strategic Plan for Malaria Prevention, Control and Elimination (NSPMPCE) (2011- 2015) which was followed from strategic plan developed following the 2007. In this retrospective study secondary data were taken from Dangila Health Center from 2012-2016 to determine the prevalence of malaria in relation to other previous works and the national intervention strategic plans. Accordingly, a total of 22,200 blood films were requested for malaria diagnosis of which 3,688 (16.6%) were confirmed as malaria cases. The highest prevalence of 25.9% was recorded in 2013 followed by the prevalence of 20% in 2012. The lowest infections of 9.1% and 9.2% were recorded in 2015 and 2016, respectively. This indicating 65% and 42 % decrease in malaria infection at the latter periods. The drastic reduction may be due to the intervention activities of the local branch of the NSPMPCE in the Woreda through various activities such as delivery of insecticide treated nets (ITNs) ITNs to the community application of indoor residual spray (IRS) use of effective drug coartem for the treatment of malaria and management of breeding site of the vector. The data also showed more males (64%) were infected than females (36%), and the active age groups of 15-44 and 5-14 were more vulnerable to infection due to their outdoor activities. Regarding the parasites, Plasmodium vivax accounted for more infections (69%) than Plasmodium falciparum (31%). The highest peak of 37% of malaria cases was recorded between September and November months followed by 27% of infection during the months of June to August. Although the overall pattern
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of infection showed the dominance of P. vivax, interestingly, the months of September-November and March-May showed slightly higher number of P. falciparum cases. In general, the prevalence of malaria decreased in 2015 and 2016 by 16%, indicating control strategies were relevant. However, on the spot surveillance and collection of primary data is necessary to validate the interventions for secondary clinical data were prone to many fluctuations, misdiagnosis, and disorganization of data during recording.
Key words/phrases; Age groups, ITN, national strategy, P. vivax, P. falciparum, P. ovale, P. malariae, P. knowlesi.
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Keywords
Age Groups, ITN, National Strategy, P. Vivax, P. Falciparum, P. Ovale, P. Malariae, P. Knowlesi