Medical and DNBI admissions to the Role 3 field hospital at Camp Bastion during Operation Herrick

Medical and DNBI admissions to the UK Role 3 field hospital in Iraq during Op TELIC

“…The reduction in gastroenteritis admissions could be due to improvements in prevention and early treatment, compared with Iraq, and due to the fact that medical evacuation from forward operating bases was more difficult and less likely to occur for such cases in Afghanistan. Overall 426 cases (65%) were judged to have an infectious cause for their illnesses in Iraq, which was similar to the 71% figure for Afghanistan 2. These data could be useful in defining what subspecialties are recruited into our military general medicine cadre and what diseases are covered in annual and pre-deployment training for military physicians.…”

“…However, this could probably be done retrospectively and would be worthwhile in view of what the National Audit Office has said about the MOD needing to do more data analysis on this topic 4. Until more detailed figures are available, the work of clinicians collecting such data at Role 3 and Role 4 medical facilities1 2 5 will remain vital and should be officially supported.…”

UK Role 4 military infectious diseases and tropical medicine cases in 2005–2013

“…Comparing this with Iraq data medical cases varied from 63%–71% of admissions (8.3–45.8 cases per day) during 2003–2004 in Iraq4 5 to 20% of admissions (1.9 cases per day) during 2011–2013 in Afghanistan 6. Overall, 65% of medical admissions in Iraq2 and 71% of those in Afghanistan3 had an infectious cause (Table 1). In Iraq, 90% of medical admissions were discharged back to their units and 9% were medically evacuated overseas,2 whereas in Afghanistan, the equivalent figures were 72% discharged and 27% evacuated 6…”

“…DNBI accounted for 91% of British military admissions to the Role 3 field hospital during Op TELIC in Iraq and overall 19% of those deployed required admission for this reason 2. During Op HERRICK in Afghanistan, where evacuation from forward operating bases was more difficult, the equivalent figures were 71% of admissions and 9% of all those deployed 3. Data on medical admissions in Afghanistan were collected systematically for a 2-year period between 2011 and 2013.…”

An outbreak inside an epidemic: managing an infectious disease outbreak while treating Ebola

“…In Op TELIC in Iraq, 91% of admissions to field hospitals were for disease and non-battle injury (DNBI);1 the equivalent figure for Op HERRICK in Afghanistan was 71% 2. Infectious gastroenteritis was responsible for a large proportion of these cases in both theatres; it was the most common cause of medical hospital admission in Afghanistan,3 where troop survey data showed that 40% of soldiers had at least one episode of diarrhoea during their deployment.…”