Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: UMLS:C0038187 (starvation)
 24,951 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

In 1992, the worst drought in recorded history hit southern Africa. It especially affected the eastern area of Swaziland where staff at a rural district hospital, Good Shepherd Hospital in Siteki, struggled to treat rising numbers of ill and malnourished people. 10% of the population in this area reached the advanced stage of starvation. Almost 50% did not have enough food to meet their nutritional needs. Women had to travel as far as 15 miles to retrieve water from tankers and sometimes wait for days because other water sources evaporated. Maize did not grow. The subsistence farmers and their families, who made up most of the population, were able to use food stored from the year before, but it only postponed hunger. They sold their cattle (their symbol of wealth), borrowed money, and migrated to cities, leaving children and grandparents to provide for themselves. This area also had an influx of refugees from Mozambique who tended to receive more food than the natives. The incidence, but not the types, of diseases increased much during the drought. These diseases included diarrhea, respiratory infections, measles, marasmus, kwashiorkor, and vitamin deficiencies. The drought did reduce the incidence of malaria, however. Nongovernmental organizations helped with food and in measuring the effects of the drought, e.g., with anthropometric surveys of young children. The international community offered to send Swaziland more than 100,000 tons of cereal, but by December 1992 the cereal had not arrived. The people distributed the limited food to those most in need. The limited maize available for distribution was yellow, but the people were accustomed to white maize and believed yellow maize to be poisonous. When droughts occur, the crux of the problem in developing countries is the pressure exerted by multinational lending institutions to earn foreign currency to pay interest on national debt.
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PMID:Another African disaster. 846 97

Two patterns of response, that due to starvation or semistarvation and that due the stress, determine whether protein-calorie malnutrition of the adult marasmus variety or hypoalbuminemic malnutrition will occur in any particular nonmalignant disease. The latter condition can have two major components, the neuroendocrine response to injury, which is in large measure mediated by hormones of the hypothalamus and adrenal gland, and the panoply of responses to interleukin-1 production and release by macrophages and monocytes upon activation, usually by phagocytosis. In some cancer patients with weight loss there are many similarities to an interleukin-1 response including increases in resting energy expenditure, whole-body protein flux and synthesis and glucose flux and recycling, hypoalbuminemia and increased albumin catabolic rates, and an adaptive low T3 state that suggest a similar injury/infection response. Separation of cancer patients with malnutrition into those with an injury/infection response and those with simple starvation may explain the heterogeneous response to nutritional support among malnourished cancer patients and suggest new feeding regimens that may uniquely benefit the stress form of cancer malnutrition.
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PMID:Some practical and theoretic concepts in the nutritional assessment of the cancer patient. 309 48

Insights gained by a group of American maternal and child helath (MCH) care nurses during a 1983 exchange tour to Kenya, sponsored by Professional Seminar Counsultants, are decribed. Kenya is a poor, predominantly rural country. The annual population growth rate is 4.1%, and 60% of the population is under the age of 16. The government's annual per capita health expenditure is only US$4, there is little emphasis on pediatrics as a speciality, and the linguistic diversity of the population complicates the delivery of health care services. As a result of these factors, the MCH care system in Kenya differed markedly from the systems observed in previous exchange tours to China and the USSR. Kenya's population is served by a variety of government, private, and missionary hospitals and by government health centers. The health centers are staffed by 2 nurses and 2 assistants who provide maternity, family planning, and immunization services. The staff also diagnoses and treats common illnesses. Service are provided free for patients under the age of 16, and minimal fees are collected from older patients. The largest hospital in the country is the 1600 bed, Joma Kenyatta National hospital which employs 900 nurses and serves as a refereal hospital for complicated cases and as a teaching and research center. 42% of the hospital staff nurses are registered nurses and 58% are enrolled nurses. Disease patterns in Kenya and the US are markedly different. In Kenya, infectious diseases are more common than chronic diseases, and amony children the major causes of death are starvation, measles, whooping cough, malaria, tubercluosis, and diarrhea. Marasmus and protein calorie deficiency are the 2 major types of childhood malnutrition found in Kenya. Nurses frequently provide health education services and even teach mothers how to grow nutritious foods for their children. Rh incompatibility is rare in Kenya, but ABO incompatibility is common. Othr common diseases, raraly found in temperate climates, include Burkitt's lymphoma, leprosy, and tropical ataxic neuropathies. The visiting nurses were at 1st shocked by some of the practices and customs they observed; however, as they learned more about the rationall behind these practices, shock gave way to appreciation. Children's wards lacked playthings, the walls were devoid of pictures, and the rooms were sparsely furnished. The lack of material items, however, was more than compensated for by the rich stimuli provided family members and friends, who not only visited the chilren, but performed a variety of nursing tasks. The family centered approach also provided a sense of security for the patients. A Masai paramedic explained how the custom of polygamy ensures adherence to the 2-year postpartum sexual taboo which, in turn, facilitates prolonged breast feeding. The nurses also became acquainted with the social value of adolescent circumcision rites. These rites are illegal but still performed in many rural areas. The rites are physically painful, but they provide a mechanism for easing the transition from adolescent to adult status. The rites help young people assume measningful roles in the society and provide them with clearly specified identities. As a result, adolescent suicide is rara among the rural villagers.
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PMID:Health care in Africa. 646 42

Tens of thousands of Cambodian refugees are entering Thailand. Many of the new arrivals are survivors of months of starvation and are critically ill with marasmus, kwashiorkor, beriberi, anemia, malaria, diarrhea, and respiratory diseases. With volunteer medical help, field hospitals are treating patients under primitive conditions that are gradually improving. Based on experience at the Sa Kaeo refugee camp, a brief survey of the nutritional and other diseases likely to be encountered is given for the potential volunteer who may be unfamiliar with tropical medicine.
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PMID:Medical care of Cambodian refugees. 735 64