Rheumatic heart disease poses a major challenge to public health and is the most prevalent heart disease in children. The major determinants of rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease are poverty, malnutrition, overcrowding, poor housing, and a shortage of health-care resources. Although cost-effective strategies for the prevention and control of these diseases are available, they remain un...

G ROUP A streptococcal infection initiates acute rheumatic fever; rheumatic valvular heart disease is a sequela that develops during or subsequent to the acute rheumatic episode. The mechanism by which the preceding streptococcal infection produces the arthritic and constitutional symptoms and valvular heart disease is unknown. Regardless of the mechanism involved, there is little doubt that pr...

G ROUP A streptococcal infection initiates acute rheumatic fever; rheumatic valvular heart disease is a sequela that develops during or subsequent to the acute rheumatic episode. The mechanism by which the preceding streptococcal infection produces the arthritic and constitutional symptoms and valvular heart disease is unknown. Regardless of the mechanism involved, there is little doubt that pr...

BACKGROUND Acute rheumatic fever and its sequels, rheumatic heart diseases, remain major unsolved preventable health problems in Kosovo population, particularly among the disadvantages indigenous Albanian and Egyptians people. In Kosovo, despite of performing secondary prophylaxis with benzathine penicillin, acute rheumatic fever hospitalization rates have remained essentially unchanged for the...

To find out the prevalence of rheumatic fever/rheumatic heart disease in an urban area, a survey of school children aged between 5 to 16 years studying in randomly selected government schools in Kathmandu city was done. Out of 4984 students enrolled in the study 4736 were examined, the percentage of absentees being five. Revised Jones Criteria (1992) was used for the diagnosis of rheumatic feve...

It is now well established that practically all initial attacks and subsequent recurrences of rheumatic fever are precipitated by antecedent Group A hemolytic streptococcal infection. Evidence to support this concept has been based on the close epidemiologic and bacteriologic association of acute rheumatic fever and streptococcal infection (1-9) as well as on the striking similarity of the anti...

The frequency of antigen types (A, B, C, and DR) in an unselected group of 25 patients with chronic rheumatic heart disease and an unselected group of 15 patients with acute rheumatic fever was compared with that in a group of 100 healthy volunteers. All patients and controls were Arabs of Saudi origin. Only the frequency of HLA-DR4 was significantly different in the controls and the patient gr...

OBJECTIVE To measure antibody titres to cardiac, nuclear, and streptococcal antigens in different groups of rheumatic fever (n = 60) and control subjects (n = 80) with the aim of identifying cross reactive antigens of potential laboratory diagnostic value. METHODS Enzyme linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA), immunocytochemical, and electrophoretic techniques were used to measure titres of anti...