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Interview: “The situation is not going away,” says inspiring TB doctor

Posted in: Latest, TB

Dr Juli Switala (42) has treated children in Nigeria, helped fatally ill patients during the 2014 Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone, and delivered babies at a hospital in Afghanistan against a backdrop of upheaval and violence. But nowhere cuts close to her heart quite like Brooklyn Chest – the tuberculosis (TB) hospital on Cape Town’s north-western fringes. Biénne Huisman chatted with Switala about her work in hospitals around the world, the challenges of treating kids with TB, and going for a run to get away from it all.

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Hospital histories: 151 years later, the drumming of little feet at Brooklyn Chest Hospital

Posted in: Child health, Healthcare system, Latest, TB, TB

In 1984, the then-head of Brooklyn Chest TB Hospital, Dr David Jenkin lamented inadequate services for TB patients, writing that “it is unflattering to realize that only war and pestilence appear able to bring more beds for TB sufferers”. Almost 40 years later, despite major scientific advances, TB hospitals like Brooklyn Chest remain important for treating complicated forms of the disease, where specialised healthcare staff can monitor medication interactions and side-effects. Biénne Huisman takes a look back at the hospital’s 151-year history and the difference it is making in the lives of children with TB today.

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Community-based testing boosts diagnosis of infectious TB, study finds

Posted in: Healthcare system, Latest, TB, TB

Every year, tens of thousands of people who fall ill with tuberculosis in South Africa are not diagnosed. Because of this, there has been much focus on testing people earlier rather than waiting for them to show up at clinics when they are already sick. One potential solution, explored in a trial called XACT 2, is community-based testing using a point-of-care molecular test. Tiyese Jeranji spoke to experts involved with XACT 2 and unpacks the study’s findings that were recently published in Nature Medicine.

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Face to face: Prof Muki Shey on his journey from Cameroon to doing cutting-edge TB research

Posted in: Healthcare Workers, Latest, TB, TB

On 9 March, Professor Muki Shey received a silver award from the South African Medical Research Council for his “outstanding contribution to health research”. Shey is spearheading research into TB in healthcare workers from around Cape Town, scanning for those who over at least five years of high exposure to the disease at hospitals or clinics have never been infected. Biénne Huisman spoke to him about his journey from the North West of Cameroon to a lab at UCT and the value of ploughing back to help develop the next generation.

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Experts weigh in on the potential of ultrasound for diagnosing TB in kids

Posted in: Latest, TB, TB

Tuberculosis can be challenging to diagnose in children, especially very young children. This is because it is difficult for them to cough up the sputum required by gold standard molecular tests and because they have fewer TB organisms in their sputum than adults. X-ray screening may be part of the solution, but it has shortcomings. Following some interesting recent study findings, Tiyese Jeranji asks what role lung ultrasound may have in improving TB detection in kids.

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Family focus shows promise for TB prevention

Posted in: Healthcare system, Latest, TB, TB

Tuberculosis (TB) preventive therapy is highly effective in preventing TB disease and death, yet only a few people have access to it. Tiyese Jeranji reports on how Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Khayelitsha is helping TB patients, as well as their contacts, access preventive therapy in the comfort of their homes as part of a new family-centred TB care initiative.

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TB in children: Exciting treatment advances, but better tests badly needed

Posted in: Child health, Edition 12: SA’s AIDS & TB response, Edition 14: Tuberculosis, Edition 7: TB, Latest, TB, TB

Children shoulder approximately 12% of the global TB burden, and this proportion is likely higher in high TB burden countries. In South Africa, up to 30 000 children develop TB each year. Tiyese Jeranji spoke to TB expert, Dr Megan Palmer from Brooklyn Chest Hospital about treatment challenges and how to improve TB detection and treatment outcomes in children.

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