To reduce deaths of young infants and pressure on hospitals, a research suggested a new method to address serious bacterial infections.
Key findings revealed that young infants with any low-mortality-risk sign can be safely treated with outpatient care, simplifying medical care for families while maintaining effectiveness.
Young infants with moderate-mortality-risk signs who respond well to 48-hour courses of injectable antibiotics can benefit from switch therapy which is an antibiotic therapy received early and orally at home.
The findings were discussed at a dissemination programme on "Optimizing Place of Treatment and Antibiotic Regimens for Young Infants with Possible Serious Bacterial Infection (PSBI)" held at a city hotel on Monday.
The programme was hosted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Projahnmo Research Foundation (PRF).
Principal Investigator of the PSBI trials Prof. Mohammod Shahidullah said, "When a young infant (up to 28 days of age) develops any infection, two things happen: either parents take them to hospital, or provide them treatment at home due to financial hardships. The World Health Organization (WHO) wants to see if it is mandatory to send all the infants to hospitals," he said.
He also said, "Therefore, we conducted the study in three approaches, including one that patients with low infection and less death risk get the same result after the treatment as an outpatient, or inpatient."
These trials prove that infants with PSBI could be safely and effectively treated with first-generation antibiotics, such as amoxicillin, ampicillin, and gentamicin, according to the study.
The trials are crucial for resource-limited countries like Bangladesh, where limited hospital beds and challenges in referring young infants hinder neonatal care, the study also said.
"This could reduce the pressure on hospitals. Furthermore, young infants could be infected from the patients around them in the hospital," Prof. Shahidullah said.
Globally, an estimated 60-70 per cent of under-five-year-old children's deaths occur within first two months after their birth. In Bangladesh, neonatal mortality stands at 20 per 1,000 live births, with infections accounting for 20-40 per cent of these deaths.
Approximately, 8-10 per cent of infants experience at least one episode of PSBl in their first two months of life.
WHO coordinated two clinical trials concurrently across six countries: Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Tanzania, with funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
In Bangladesh, PRF and Johns Hopkins University, USA, led these trials in collaboration with WHO and the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
Study findings were shared by PRF's Executive Director Dr Salahuddin Ahmed.
Dr Shamim Ahmed Qazi and Dr Yasir Bin Nisar from WHO, Professor of Johns Hopkins University Abdullah H. Baqui, Special Assistant to the Chief Adviser Prof Dr Sayedur Rahman, Directorate General of Health Services DGHS Director General of Prof. Dr. Md. Abu Jafor, addressed the event, among others.
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