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Capacity building and stroke risk assessment in Nigerian children with sickle cell anaemia
Author(s) -
Soyebi Kofo,
Adeyemo Titilope,
Ojewunmi Oyesola,
James Funmi,
Adefalujo Kunle,
Akinyanju Olu
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
pediatric blood and cancer
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.116
H-Index - 105
eISSN - 1545-5017
pISSN - 1545-5009
DOI - 10.1002/pbc.25216
Subject(s) - medicine , stroke risk , transcranial doppler , economic shortage , stroke (engine) , pediatrics , ischemic stroke , mechanical engineering , linguistics , philosophy , ischemia , government (linguistics) , engineering
Background Transcranial Doppler ultrasonography (TCD) measures blood flow velocities in the large cerebral vessels and thus, detects the risk of stroke. This report describes a capacity building program which enabled the use of TCD for detecting stroke risk and also describes the pattern of non‐imaging TCD examinations seen in Nigerian children with sickle cell anaemia (SCA). Procedure Ten university graduates were trained on the use of TCD in a 5‐day capacity building workshop after which, the three best candidates were employed to provide a 5‐day a week TCD screening service in Lagos. Data from TCD examination collected between March 2011 and September 2013 were analysed and reported. Result Between March 2011 and September 2013, 2,331 children with SCA aged 2–16 years had TCD studies. TCD's findings were classified as normal (standard risk) in 70.4%, conditional in 19% and abnormal (high risk) in 9.3%. The majority of children (76.9%) in the high risk category were aged 2–8 years. TCD study was inadequate for risk categorisation in 1.3% of the patients. Conclusion Effective capacity building of middle level manpower is feasible and can provide a credible TCD screening service to communities with a high demand and a shortage of trained professionals. The pattern of TCD abnormalities seen in Africa are comparable to those obtained in several previous worldwide reports. Pediatr Blood Cancer 2014;61:2263–2266. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.