Active clinical trials for "Infections"

Malnutrition is considered one of the most prevalent risk factors for morbidity and mortality in children under five. An estimated 20% of children in the developing world are malnourished [1] and poor nutrition is linked to more than half of all child deaths worldwide [2]. Malnutrition in early childhood may lead to cognitive and physical deficits and may cause similar deficits in future generations as malnourished mothers give birth to low birth weight children [3]. In addition, malnutrition increases susceptibility and incidence of infections and is associated with diminished response to vaccines. The MAL-ED Project is designed to determine the impact of enteric infections/diarrhea that alter gut function and impair children's nutrition, growth and development to help develop new intervention strategies that can break the vicious enteric infection-malnutrition cycle and reduce its global burden. The overall objective of the MAL-ED Project is to quantify the associations of specific enteric pathogens, measures of physical and mental development, micronutrient malnutrition, gut function biomarkers, the gut microbiome, and immune responses in very young children in resource-limited settings across eight sites that vary by culture, economics, geography, and climate. The central hypothesis of the MAL-ED Project is that infection (and co-infection) with specific enteropathogens leads to impaired growth and development and to diminished immune response to orally administered vaccines by causing intestinal inflammation and/or by altering intestinal barrier and absorptive function. Data analyses will test for associations between enteropathogen infections and growth/development to help illuminate: which micro-organisms or mixed infections are most frequently associated with growth faltering and poor development; and at what age specific infections cause the most disruption to growth and development and impair immune response.

Infectious disease is the single biggest cause of death worldwide. New infectious agents,such as the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus and new strains of influenza continually emerge and require new investigations to understand pathogen biology and pathogenesis in the host. Witness the Influenza A pandemic. Concerns about new viruses and their impact on health and the economy are also increasing. Current alerts sent out by the Ministry of Health (about the novel coronavirus and the Avian influenza A virus) are but cases in point. These likely reflect advances in science, which have allowed novel pathogens to be identified. Because of its geography, Singapore is vulnerable to new pathogens through importation or the global travel of its citizens. Hence we must be ever ready to meet unexpected challenges anytime. On the administrative front, Singapore General Hospital has a Disease Outbreak Task-force which has in place many plans that can be activated should there be a large-scale epidemic. What is missing thus far is a program that will enable us to perform scientific studies in the setting of an epidemic. Hence in this study, we will, in collaboration with the Program in Emerging Infectious Diseases (EID) in Duke-National University of Singapore Postgraduate Medical School, attempt to (i) detect novel, previously undescribed pathogens; (ii) characterize viruses (not necessarily novel but emerging and re-emerging) that are raising concern or causing clusters or epidemics in the hospital and/or country; (iii) characterize immune responses to such viruses in healthcare workers as well as patients (those affected by these viruses and those exposed to the affected). The techniques that will be used will be those not routinely available in a hospital's service labs. Some patients will remain undiagnosable with the best available technology. Since new laboratory tools that can detect previously undiagnosed pathogens may become available in the future, the study also aims to archive specimens from patients whose illnesses remain undiagnosed.

The investigators hypothesis: Presence of anti-GGT (antibody against GGT) indicates H. pylori infection.

Analysis of several characteristics of blood from pregnant women with CMV infection according to maternal-fetal transmission. These include CMV viral load, cytokine profile in response to in-vitro stimulation with CMV peptides, meticulous analysis of anti CMV antibodies, maternal DNA polymorphism and microarray of gene expression.

To compare the time to pathogen eradication, and the relationship to the time to clinical improvement, between ceftaroline and case-matched vancomycin treated controls in the treatment of adults with serious infections caused by Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA).

The investigators believe that there is an association between H. pylori infection and nutritional status and between H. pylori infection and cognitive development. The current study will examine this association in Israeli children, aged 6-12 years.

The Zika epidemic has spread into the three French Overseas Departments in the Caribbean (DFAs). It is therefore urgent to set up tools to collect clinical and paraclinical data for the evaluation of potential complications due to having ZIKV infection during pregnancy. This study is meant to collect, within usual care practices, clinical and paraclinical information (including imaging and laboratory results) as well as biological samples allowing the precise description of the consequences of ZIKV infection during pregnancy. This study is the 2nd arm of a global research program in the 3 French Overseas Departments in the Caribbean. It is complementary to the first arm (ZIKA-DFA-FE) consisting in the follow-up of women in the French Overseas Departments who are pregnant during the Zika epidemic period. The study population is made up of infants born during and up to 9 months after the end of the Zika epidemic period in the French Overseas Departments. The data and biological specimens collected for this project will be done so through the recommended standard of care which has been put in place considering the ZIKV epidemic in the 3 French Overseas Departments, upholding existing recommendations (profession and/or recommendation from the public health authorities)

This is a retrospective, multicentre, observational study to assess the trends in antibiotic utilization and hospital ecology with respect to susceptibility patterns of selected bacterial isolates to the utilized antibiotics.

In adult, the prevalence of mycobacterial infections is increased with age is largely unknown. IFN-gamma-IL-12/23 axis or NF-kappaB pathways might also plays crucial roles in adult against mycobacteria. Based on this hypothesis, the investigators had applied a functional assay to these pathways in patients with mycobacterial infection.

The investigators are trying to evaluate the performance of neutrophil and lymphocyte counts as a risk factor of deep sternal wound infection after coronary artery bypass graft surgery.