QUESTION I'm hoping to get some clarity on the following, as I've had a few rather large disparities in the information I've been given. My mother (66) recently had a very serious bout of Malaria and was hospitalised in Johannesburg for just over a week. (Both my Mom and Dad live in Tete, Mozambique) At one stage, she almost needed a blood transfusion as her parasite count was above 10% (12,5% to … [Read more...]
Shelf Life of Malarone
March 28, 2013 By Leave a Comment
QUESTION I've just finished reading several years' worth of your responses to questions and I'm very impressed. Thank you for being surely one of the best sources on the web. My question pertains to the shelf life of Malarone tablets. My husband and I have been in Madagascar for three weeks now and will stay for another two and a half months. I am very preventive-oriented (long sleeves, pants … [Read more...]
Malaria IgG Test
January 24, 2013 By Leave a Comment
QUESTION My uncle has been ill since returning from Belize, where he was bitten by multiple mosquitoes. He has every symptom of malaria, and did a malaria antibody IgG test, which came back high at 1.49 that was ordered by his primary care physician. He has now been to a hematologist/oncologist and even an infections disease doctor who have both ignored the lab result. He has since done … [Read more...]
Can the PCR blood test identify hypnozoites?
November 3, 2012 By 2 Comments
QUESTION I have never been diagnosed with malaria but returned from Turkey in 2007 (P. Vivax endemic area; Diarbykar & Mardin areas). My symptoms were consistent with malaria and I have now had 5 relapses since then, averaging one occurrence per year. I now have impaired kidney functioning and I am uncertain if this could be because of undiagnosed malaria? Would the PCR blood test at … [Read more...]
Symptoms of Malaria but Tests Negative
October 27, 2012 By 2 Comments
QUESTION My sister has been suffering from fever from past 22 days temperature varying from 102-106 with chills shivering, headache, body pain,nausea and muscle ache but tested negative for malaria. She also tested negative for dengue, swine flu, hiv, and many others. So out of frustration we gave her mefloc 250 and she seems to be responding. She is still having fever that is after 12 hrs of … [Read more...]
Abdominal Pain in Malaria
October 24, 2012 By 3 Comments
QUESTION What is the cause of abdominal pain in malaria? ANSWER Often, abdominal pain in malaria occurs in the early stages of malaria infection (first week or so) and can be caused by the rapid enlargement of the liver and spleen as they become inflamed. During malaria infection, and particularly that with Plasmodium falciparum, the most deadly and severe form of malaria, large numbers … [Read more...]
Bio-larvicides
October 21, 2012 By Leave a Comment
QUESTION Why is there no mention here of all the work being done on biolarvicides - the low cost solution for malaria control? ANSWER Actually, we had a question a while ago about the ECOWAS program in West Africa, which centers around the use of biolarvicides. A link to that question, and the answer, is provided here: http://www.malaria.com/questions/ecowas-malaria. The most common … [Read more...]
Female Mosquitos and Malaria
October 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment
QUESTION How come only the female mosquitoes can pass malaria? ANSWER Malaria is transmitted among humans by female mosquitoes of the genus Anopheles. Female mosquitoes need to bite people to get blood, in order to carry out egg production. These blood meals are the link between the human and the mosquito hosts in the parasite life cycle. Only female mosquitoes feed on blood, thus … [Read more...]
