Delivery of Health Care ; Humans ; Office Visits ; Physician-Patient Relations ; Quality Assurance, Health Care ; Residence Characteristics ; Singapore ; Time Factors

Disclosure ; Health Care Costs ; trends ; Hospital Charges ; trends ; Hospitalization ; economics ; Humans ; Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome ; economics ; Singapore

Antitubercular Agents ; economics ; therapeutic use ; Directly Observed Therapy ; Drug Resistance, Multiple, Bacterial ; Humans ; Singapore ; epidemiology ; Tuberculosis, Multidrug-Resistant ; drug therapy ; economics

Diagnostic Errors ; prevention & control ; Emergency Service, Hospital ; Humans ; Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome ; diagnosis ; World Health Organization

Coronavirus Infections ; epidemiology ; Humans ; Middle East ; epidemiology ; Respiratory Tract Infections ; epidemiology ; virology ; Singapore ; epidemiology ; Syndrome

Animals ; Birds ; Communicable Disease Control ; methods ; Disease Outbreaks ; prevention & control ; statistics & numerical data ; Health Planning ; Humans ; Influenza A Virus, H5N1 Subtype ; Influenza in Birds ; epidemiology ; virology ; Risk Factors ; Singapore ; epidemiology

Recent epidemics and pandemics have highlighted a number of ethical concerns about the response to the increasing threat of emerging infectious diseases. Some of these ethical concerns are very fundamental. They include why a pandemic was declared, how much clinical information can be collected for public health without threatening patient confidentiality and how to ensure fairness in the distribution of resources. We discuss these issues and suggest approaches to resolve these dilemmas as we anticipate the next pandemic.
Communicable Disease Control ; Communicable Diseases ; epidemiology ; Disease Outbreaks ; ethics ; Ethics, Medical ; Global Health ; Humans ; Pandemics ; ethics ; Public Health Practice ; ethics ; Quarantine ; Sentinel Surveillance ; Singapore ; epidemiology

Acute Kidney Injury ; blood ; etiology ; therapy ; Anti-Retroviral Agents ; administration & dosage ; CD4 Lymphocyte Count ; Disease Progression ; Embolization, Therapeutic ; methods ; Fatal Outcome ; Gastrointestinal Hemorrhage ; diagnostic imaging ; etiology ; physiopathology ; therapy ; Glucocorticoids ; administration & dosage ; HIV Infections ; complications ; diagnosis ; immunology ; HIV-1 ; drug effects ; isolation & purification ; Humans ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Purpura, Schoenlein-Henoch ; complications ; diagnosis ; physiopathology ; Radiography ; Renal Dialysis ; methods

With our rapidly ageing population and advancing treatments for patients with haematological, oncologic and rheumatological diseases, there are increasing numbers of immunocompromised patients presenting to primary care and general hospitals with opportunistic infections. This review considers the trends of these infections across four representative subgroups: fungal infections following haematopoietic stem cell transplant; viral infections post solid organ transplant; mycobacterial infections during treatment with targeted biological agents; and bacterial infections as a cause of fever in neutropenia. We also consider the impact of host, pathogens, environments and treatments on the epidemiology and outcomes of these infections.
Adult ; Bacterial Infections ; complications ; Communicable Diseases ; etiology ; Female ; Fever ; etiology ; Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation ; adverse effects ; Humans ; Immunocompromised Host ; Immunosuppressive Agents ; adverse effects ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Mycoses ; etiology ; Neutropenia ; etiology ; Opportunistic Infections ; epidemiology ; etiology ; Organ Transplantation ; adverse effects ; Virus Diseases ; etiology

Adolescent ; Adult ; Anticoagulants ; therapeutic use ; Aortic Valve Stenosis ; congenital ; surgery ; Dengue ; complications ; Heart Valve Prosthesis ; Humans ; Male ; Thrombocytopenia ; etiology ; Warfarin ; therapeutic use