Evolution of the Etiologies of Purulent Meningitis in Children over a Period of 24 Months in Conflict-Affected Rural Areas of the Central African Republic after the Introduction of 2 New Vaccines in the Expanded Vaccination Program

Background and Objective: Purulent meningitis is a therapeutic emergency and remains a real public health problem in the world, particularly in limited resources countries. The study aimed to describe the epidemiological clinical, etiological and scalable features of purulent meningitis in children in Bria. Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted from January 1, 2018 to December 31, 2019 (24 months). It included all suspected cases of purulent meningitis in children aged 0 to 15 years, confirmed by agglutination with Pastorex meningitis. A standard sheet was used to collect the data which was entered and analyzed on Epi Info 7 software. Results: A total of 37 cases of purulent meningitis were confirmed among 90 suspected cases. The female gender predominated (59.5%), with a sex ratio of 0.7. The age group from 0 to 11 months was majority (48.6%). Nearly 2 thirds of children were not vaccinated (64.8%). The most frequent functional signs were fever (83.8%), and convulsion (51.4%). The etiologies were Streptococcus (51.4%), Neisseria meningitidis (35.1%) and Haemophilus influenzae (13.5%). Therapeutic success under 3rd generation cephalosporin treatment was obtained in 86.5% including 8.1% with sequelae;13.5% of death was observed. Streptococcus was the most lethal bacterium at 21.1%. Conclusion: The results of these studies show that pediatric purulent meningitis is still common despite the availability of free vaccination. They require early therapeutic management to limit the occurrence of sequelae and death. Hence, it is important to strengthen prevention strategies.

Significant Improvement in Tuberculosis Diagnosis by Detection of the Wall Lipoarabinomannan from Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Central African Republic (CAR)

Background and Objective: Tuberculosis is one of the leading causes of morbi-mortality, especially in developing countries, due to delayed diagnosis and management. The goal of this study is to assess the contribution of lipoarabinomannan (LAM) in improving tuberculosis (TB) diagnosis in the Central African Republic (C.A.R.). Methods: We conducted a retrospective study at the Regional University Hospital of Bria. The records of patients hospitalized, tested by Determine® TB LAM Ag (Alere, Medical Co, LTD, Chiba, Japan) immunochromatographic test for the detection of LAM in urine, associated or not with acid-fast bacilli (AFB) research by Ziehl-Neelsen stain, were selected from August to October 2020. Results: During this study, 152 files were selected. Among them, there were 50.0% of children aged 14 or less (≤14 years: 33.6% + 16.4%) and 50.0% of adults represented. Patients living in the displaced person camp represented a larger group (65.1%) than those in the other 2 sites. There were seventy-four patients (i.e. 48.7%) who did not benefit from screening for AFB. For the other seventy-eight (i.e. 51.3%), there were 17.1% positive results for the search of AFB. However, among the 152 patients, there was a positive HIV serology in 30.9% of cases (i.e. 47 out of 152) and a positive Determine® TB LAM Ag in 38.2% of cases (i.e. 58 out of 152). It appears that Determine® TB LAM Ag was significantly more able to diagnose tuberculosis than AFB (p 0.003). The 58 patients diagnosed with TB LAM included 20 children who could not provide sputum and HIV-infected patients (p 0.03). Conclusion: The results of this study showed that the microscopy for AFB made it possible to make the diagnosis of tuberculosis in 17.1% of patients against 38.2% for the Alere Determine® TB LAM Ag test. This result highlights the need for routine use of LAM detection to improve the diagnosis of tuberculosis. The conduct of a subsequent study combining Xpert MTB/RIF would improve the diagnosis of tuberculosis using all 3 tests.