Interest in global health (GH) among medical students worldwide is measurably increasing. There is a concomitant emphasis on emphasizing globally-relevant health professions education. Through a structured literature review, expert consensus recommendations, and contact with relevant professional organizations, we review the existing state of GH education in US medical schools for which data were available. Several recommendations from professional societies have been developed, along with a renewed emphasis on competencies in global health. The implementation of these recommendations was not observed as being uniform across medical schools, with variation noted in the presence of global health curricula. Recommendations for including GH in medical education are suggested, as well as ways to formalize GH curricula, while providing flexibility for innovation and adaptation

Increasing demand for global health education in medical training has driven the growth of educational programs predicated on a model of short-term medical service abroad. Almost two-thirds of matriculating medical students expect to participate in a global health experience during medical school, continuing into residency and early careers. Despite positive intent, such short-term experiences in global health (STEGHs) may exacerbate global health inequities and even cause harm. Growing out of the "medical missions" tradition, contemporary participation continues to evolve. Ethical concerns and other disciplinary approaches, such as public health and anthropology, can be incorpo rated to increase effectiveness and sustainability, and to shift the culture of STEGHs from focusing on trainees and their home institutions to also considering benefits in host communities and nurtur ing partnerships. The authors propose four core principles to guide ethical development of educational STEGHs: (1) skills building in cross-cultural effective ness and cultural humility, (2) bidirectional participatory relationships, (3) local capacity building, and (4) long-term sustainability. Application of these principles highlights the need for assessment of STEGHs: data collection that allows transparent compar isons, standards of quality, bidirectionality of agreements, defined curricula, and ethics that meet both host and sending countries' standards and needs. To capture the enormous potential of STEGHs, a paradigm shift in the culture of STEGHs is needed to ensure that these experiences balance training level, personal competencies, medical and cross-cultural ethics, and educational objectives to minimize harm and maximize benefits for all involved.

Background: Recent surveillance data from Bangladesh indicate rising HIV infection among intravenous drug users (IDU) in the country. We suggest a likely association between HIV risk factors in this group and other groups, such as males who have sex with males (MSM).

BackgroundBasic Life Support (BLS) is the recognition of sudden cardiac arrest and activation of the emergency response system, followed by resuscitation, and rapid defibrillation. According to WHO, Pakistan has one of the highest mortality rates from accidental deaths therefore assessment and comparison of BLS knowledge in health professionals is crucial. We thereby aim to assess and compare the knowledge of BLS in doctors, dentists and nurses.MethodsA multi-centric cross-sectional survey was conducted in Karachi at different institutions belonging to the private as well as government sector from January to March 2018. We used a structured questionnaire which was adapted from pretested questionnaires that have been used previously in similar studies. Descriptive statistics were analyzed using SPSS v22.0, where adequate knowledge was taken as a score of at least 50%. P < 0.05 was considered as significant. Logistic regression was used to identify the factors affecting the knowledge regarding BLS in health care professionals.ResultsThe responders consisted of 140 doctors, nurses and dentists each. Only one individual (dentist) received a full score of 100%. In total, 58.3% of the population had inadequate knowledge. Average scores of doctors, dentists and nurses were 53.5, 43.3 and 38.4% respectively. Doctors, participants with prior training in BLS and those with 6 to 10 years after graduation were found to be a significant predictor of adequate knowledge, on multivariate analysis.ConclusionEven though knowledge of BLS in doctors is better than that of dentists and nurses, overall knowledge of health care professionals is extremely poor. Present study highlights the need for a structured training of BLS for health care workers.

In terms of their applicability to the field of tropical medicine, geographical information systems (GIS) have developed enormously in the last two decades. This article reviews some of the pertinent and representative applications of GIS, including the use of such systems and remote sensing for the mapping of Chagas disease and human helminthiases, the use of GIS in vaccine trials, and the global applications of GIS for health-information management, disease epidemiology, and pandemic planning. The future use of GIS as a decision-making tool and some barriers to the widespread implementation of such systems in developing settings are also discussed.