Search

Skip to main content Accessibility help

Only show content I have access to (0)

Chapters (1)

Over 3 years (1)

From year:

To year:

Apply

Medicine (1)

Cambridge University Press (1)

1 results

12 - Evidence-based medicine in the Third World
- By Ruth Hutchinson, Harare Central Hospital, Harare, Zimbabwe
Edited by Ann Møller, KAS Herlev, Copenhagen, Tom Pedersen, Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen
Book:

Evidence-based Anaesthesia and Intensive Care

Published online:

05 September 2009

Print publication:

09 October 2006, pp 117-126
- Chapter
- - Get access
    
    Check if you have access via personal or institutional login
    
    Log in Register
- Export citation
Summary

This chapter focuses on the differences between the West and the Third World, such as poverty, age of the population, disease burden, lack of skilled staff and equipment. The Third World has a predominantly young population. Birth rate is higher than in the West, but there is high mortality amongst the under 5 years old, and since the HIV/AIDS epidemic a high mortality in early middle life. Evidence-based medicine starts with a clinical problem, and with the formation of a question regarding optimal care. The mother to child transmission (MTCT) studies for Sub-Saharan Africa can only be done in the Third World situation. The teaching of non-physician anaesthetists, who give the majority of anaesthetics in many countries, is often hampered by the absence of any studies as to what is the best in the conditions in which they are working.