BACKGROUND Mental health advocacy groups are an effective way of pushing the mental health agenda and putting pressure on national governments to observe the right to health; however, there is limited research that highlights best practices for such groups in low-resource settings. In an effort to improve the scaling up of mental health in Sierra Leone, stakeholders came together to form the co...

BACKGROUND Sierra Leone has one of the highest maternal mortality ratios in the world. Efforts to reduce maternal mortality have included initiatives to encourage more women to deliver at health facilities. Despite the introduction of the free health care initiative for pregnant women, many women still continue to deliver at home, with few having access to a skilled birth attendant. In addition...

BACKGROUND By 28 June 2015, there were a total of 11,234 deaths from the Ebola virus disease (EVD) in five West African countries (Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Nigeria and Sierra Leone). The objective of this study was to estimate the future productivity losses associated with EVD deaths in these West African countries, in order to encourage increased investments in national health systems. METHODS...

UNLABELLED Sierra Leone has one of the highest rates of female genital mutilation (FGM) in the world, and yet little is known about the health consequences of the practice. PURPOSE To explore whether and what kind of FGM-related health complications girls and women in Sierra Leone experience, and to elucidate their health care-seeking behaviors. PATIENTS AND METHODS A feasibility study was ...

OBJECTIVES An effective vaccine is needed to protect against severe rotavirus disease, an important cause of gastroenteritis. Since there are no data on the incidence and antigenic diversity of rotavirus infection in Sierra Leone, we studied its epidemiology to enable an effective vaccine strategy to be designed. METHODS Children between the ages of 3 and 30 months presenting with gastroenter...

Ebola patients in Sierra Leone will receive amiodarone, a well known and cheap anti-arrhythmia drug, in a randomised controlled trial led by the Italian non-governmental organisation Emergency. The trial is expected to start in a few weeks, when a 100 bed hospital recently built by the UK Department for International Development will be entrusted to Emergency. The hospital is one of six built a...

The Colony of Sierra Leone originated in the sale and cession of a portion of land to Captain John Taylor in 1788 which was placed under the protection of the British Government. The main purpose of the Colony in its inception was to secure a home on the African continent for a number of natives of Africa and some others who, due to various circumstances, had been separated from their countries...

BACKGROUND The WHO declared the 2014 west African Ebola epidemic a public health emergency of international concern in view of its potential for further international spread. Decision makers worldwide are in need of empirical data to inform and implement emergency response measures. Our aim was to assess the potential for Ebola virus to spread across international borders via commercial air tra...

In October 2014, the College of Medicine and Allied Health Sciences of the University of Sierra Leone, the Sierra Leone Ministry of Health and Sanitation, and CDC joined the global effort to accelerate assessment and availability of candidate Ebola vaccines and began planning for the Sierra Leone Trial to Introduce a Vaccine against Ebola (STRIVE). STRIVE was an individually randomized controll...

Sierra Leone was the most severely affected country in Western Africa during the 2013-2016 outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD). Previous genome surveillance studies have revealed the origin, diversity, and evolutionary dynamics of the Ebola virus (EBOV); however, the information regarding EBOV sequences is insufficient, especially the clinical outcomes, given that the correlation between the ...