Study on kits to enhance malaria treatment to begin

Dr Ansah stressing a point

A study to promote the rational prescription of anti-malarial drugs among chemical sellers through the introduction and use of rapid diagnostic test (RDT) kits for testing malaria parasites within minutes is to begin at the Dodowa Health Research Centre in Ghana.
Dr Evelyn Ansah, District Director of Health Services in the Dangme West District, where the Centre is located, said there is the need to ensure rational prescription and dispensing of the newly introduced anti-malarial drugs, known as Artemisinin-Based Combination (ACT) therapies.
ACTs have replaced chloroquine, a drug which is no longer effective against the disease because of its resistance to the parasite. Ghana has chosen an ACT known as artesunate-amodiaquine as its first line drug to treat malaria.
Dr Ansah said the two-year study would be conducted among some 52 chemical shops in the district with the aim of finding out the impact of the introduction of RDTs on the dispensing behaviour of the chemical sellers, who are the main non-formal outlets in dispensing drugs at community level.
Dr Ansah was speaking at a workshop in Dodowa organized by the African Media and Malaria Research Network to update journalists on some on-going malaria research activities at the Dodowa Health Research Centre in the Dangme West district.
She said as part of the trials, ACTs would be made available at these chemical shops under an Affordable Medicines Facility-Malaria programme, which aims at ensuring that access to effective anti-malarial drugs improves especially in the private sector, which is not the case at present.
Dr Ansah said the trial among chemical sellers follows from an earlier trial conducted at the health facility level where RDT kits for malaria were introduced to study the prescribing habits of doctors and clinicians at health facilities and patients’ attitude to RDT. The overall aim is to reduce over prescription of anti-malarial drugs at the health facility level.
She said during the trial conducted at the health facility level, a total of 9,236 patients were screened and 3,452 patients were exposed to the presumptive diagnosis setting where the clinician had to depend on only clinical suspicion without a laboratory test and use of microscope to diagnose and treat patients.
She said some 3,811 patients were also exposed to the setting where microscopy was available.
Dr Ansah said one key finding was that in the setting where no microscopy was available the introduction of RDTs reduced over prescription by approximately 36%.
She said data collection on the perceptions of health providers and patients on the use of RDTs and on the cost-effectiveness of introducing RDTs has been completed and were being analyzed.

Malaria is endemic in the country but not all patients who present with a headache or fever would be suffering from malaria. Presumptive and mismanagement of malaria cases are not uncommon at these health facilities and the introduction of RDT kits is expected to help in proper diagnosis and management of malaria cases, if adopted as a policy.