Makerere University

About: Makerere University is a education organization based out in Kampala, Uganda. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Public health. The organization has 7220 authors who have published 12405 publications receiving 366520 citations. The organization is also known as: Makerere University Kampala & MUK.

Azithromycin for treating uncomplicated typhoid and paratyphoid fever (enteric fever).

Abstract: Reason for withdrawal from publication 2011, Issue 10: Review status: Current question – no update intended. Azithromycin treatments are included in the review: Fluoroquinolones for treating typhoid and paratyphoid fever (enteric fever). (Thaver D, Zaidi AKM, Critchley JA, Azmatullah A, Madni SA, Bhutta ZA. Fluoroquinolones for treating typhoid and paratyphoid fever (enteric fever). Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2008, Issue 4. Art. No.: CD004530. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD004530.pub3.) This latter review is being updated, and will be published in late 2011. The azithrocycin review is therefore withdrawn. The review status reports aims to help the reader understand whether the review concerns a current question, and whether it is up to date. It is a pilot project by the Cochrane Infectious Diseases Group editors to help readers and we welcome feedback. It has three components: 1. Whether the review is currently relevant. For this, we classify reviews into: Historical question, where the intervention or policy has been superseded by new medical developments (such as a new drug); Current question, which is still relevant to current policy or practice. 2. Whether the review is up to date: for this, we classify reviews into: Up to date; Update pending; or No update intended. 3. An explanation of the review status. This narrative text provides a little more additional information to explain the categories selected. To view the published versions of this article, please click the 'Other versions' tab.

Determinants of climate change adaptation among male and female headed farm households in eastern uganda

Abstract: Adaptation is considered an appropriate response to climate change and variability, especially for the smallholder farmers. However, the response decisions and actions of male and female farmers may be influenced by various factor and factor combinations that are not adequately understood. We hypothesized that both male and female farmers are climate change conscious and responsive; and that there is a gender dimension to the choice of a climate change adaptation strategy. We utilised a combination of descriptive statistics and logistic regression analysis to study the factors that influence the choice of a decision to adapt to a climate change scenario. Using cross-sectional data collected from 136 households in eastern Uganda, we undertook the analysis at two levels; pooled sample analysis and a gender disaggregated analysis. Contrary to perceived wisdom and evidence from other empirical studies, the factors that influence the climate change adaptation decision vary considerably between male and female household heads. Climate change adaptation decisions of female heads depended on and were sensitive to more covariates compared to the decisions of male heads of household. Furthermore, climate change adaptation decisions of female heads were influenced by more liquid household assets, while those of male heads were influenced by real estate, especially land. Additionally, beyond gender, other demographic factors appeared to play no significant role in the decision to adapt to climate change.

Determinants of infant growth in Eastern Uganda: a community-based cross-sectional study.

Abstract: Background Child under-nutrition is a leading factor underlying child mortality and morbidity in Sub-Saharan Africa. Several studies from Uganda have reported impaired growth, but there have been few if any community-based infant anthropometric studies from Eastern Uganda. The aim of this study was to describe current infant growth patterns using WHO Child Growth Standards and to determine the extent to which these patterns are associated with infant feeding practices, equity dimensions, morbidity and use of primary health care for the infants.

THE REAL McCOIL: A method for the concurrent estimation of the complexity of infection and SNP allele frequency for malaria parasites.

Abstract: As many malaria-endemic countries move towards elimination of Plasmodium falciparum, the most virulent human malaria parasite, effective tools for monitoring malaria epidemiology are urgent priorities. P. falciparum population genetic approaches offer promising tools for understanding transmission and spread of the disease, but a high prevalence of multi-clone or polygenomic infections can render estimation of even the most basic parameters, such as allele frequencies, challenging. A previous method, COIL, was developed to estimate complexity of infection (COI) from single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) data, but relies on monogenomic infections to estimate allele frequencies or requires external allele frequency data which may not available. Estimates limited to monogenomic infections may not be representative, however, and when the average COI is high, they can be difficult or impossible to obtain. Therefore, we developed THE REAL McCOIL, Turning HEterozygous SNP data into Robust Estimates of ALelle frequency, via Markov chain Monte Carlo, and Complexity Of Infection using Likelihood, to incorporate polygenomic samples and simultaneously estimate allele frequency and COI. This approach was tested via simulations then applied to SNP data from cross-sectional surveys performed in three Ugandan sites with varying malaria transmission. We show that THE REAL McCOIL consistently outperforms COIL on simulated data, particularly when most infections are polygenomic. Using field data we show that, unlike with COIL, we can distinguish epidemiologically relevant differences in COI between and within these sites. Surprisingly, for example, we estimated high average COI in a peri-urban subregion with lower transmission intensity, suggesting that many of these cases were imported from surrounding regions with higher transmission intensity. THE REAL McCOIL therefore provides a robust tool for understanding the molecular epidemiology of malaria across transmission settings.