Viral meningitis is increasingly recognised, but little is known about the frequency with which it occurs, or the causes and outcomes in the UK. We aimed to determine the incidence, causes, and ...sequelae in UK adults to improve the management of patients and assist in health service planning.
We did a multicentre prospective observational cohort study of adults with suspected meningitis at 42 hospitals across England. Nested within this study, in the National Health Service (NHS) northwest region (now part of NHS England North), was an epidemiological study. Patients were eligible if they were aged 16 years or older, had clinically suspected meningitis, and either underwent a lumbar puncture or, if lumbar puncture was contraindicated, had clinically suspected meningitis and an appropriate pathogen identified either in blood culture or on blood PCR. Individuals with ventricular devices were excluded. We calculated the incidence of viral meningitis using data from patients from the northwest region only and used these data to estimate the population-standardised number of cases in the UK. Patients self-reported quality-of-life and neuropsychological outcomes, using the EuroQol EQ-5D-3L, the 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36), and the Aldenkamp and Baker neuropsychological assessment schedule, for 1 year after admission.
1126 patients were enrolled between Sept 30, 2011, and Sept 30, 2014. 638 (57%) patients had meningitis: 231 (36%) cases were viral, 99 (16%) were bacterial, and 267 (42%) had an unknown cause. 41 (6%) cases had other causes. The estimated annual incidence of viral meningitis was 2·73 per 100 000 and that of bacterial meningitis was 1·24 per 100 000. The median length of hospital stay for patients with viral meningitis was 4 days (IQR 3–7), increasing to 9 days (6–12) in those treated with antivirals. Earlier lumbar puncture resulted in more patients having a specific cause identified than did those who had a delayed lumbar puncture. Compared with the age-matched UK population, patients with viral meningitis had a mean loss of 0·2 quality-adjusted life-years (SD 0·04) in that first year.
Viruses are the most commonly identified cause of meningitis in UK adults, and lead to substantial long-term morbidity. Delays in getting a lumbar puncture and unnecessary treatment with antivirals were associated with longer hospital stays. Rapid diagnostics and rationalising treatments might reduce the burden of meningitis on health services.
Meningitis Research Foundation and UK National Institute for Health Research.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZRSKP
“International Msc Educational Programme in Environmental Management and Modelling” (GeoNetC) is a European Commission funded project under ERASMUS+: Higher Education – International Capacity ...Building programme (Project No 561967-EPP-1-2015-1-SE-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP). It began in October 2015 and ended in October 2018. Initiated by the Lund University and partners from the Middle East countries, the GeoNetC project is an ambitious project aiming to match labour market needs with geospatial education offer both in Europe and Middle East countries. The aim of this three-year project is to enable European universities to exchange best practices and innovation with each other and with Middle Eastern universities regarding the mismatch between Europe’s geospatial education and training and the geospatial education in Middle East countries. There is a growing need for well-trained students at all levels – vocational, bachelors, masters – in the field of geospatial technologies. Obviously there is a growing number of jobs available in land surveying, mapping data collection, data processing, data delivery and turning data into information in both European and Middle East countries. Through cooperation, all partners will improve the quality of their respective academic programs. The European partners will make their courses more attractive and well adjusted for students from the Middle East. As well, they will increase the general quality and add state-of-the-art learning components to their offerings, and the partners from the region will significantly increase the academic level and quality in the education they provide. There will be spin-offs into other subjects than environment/Geomatics, since both the pedagogic models developed (e.g. e-Learning) and communication and administrative tools can be used throughout the partner universities. Therefore, this partnership cooperation will be of great value to Partner Countries as well as to Programme Countries. A number of distance learning courses/modules are developed jointly by partner institutions in Europe and the Middle East. The main aim of the network is to promote the use of spatial information and earth observation for environmental management and modelling through capacity building and institutional development, via a network in which all partners would contribute from their own positions of strength. All 13 modules are following EU higher education standards regarding e.g. ECTS, and learning outcomes. The outcome of the project, in terms of courses/modules, will be freely used among the partners, with the possibilities of offering individual courses or a whole MSc programme, whether individually or together. All produced material was evaluated/quality controlled by an external evaluation group of independent experts within environmental management and modelling, higher education, as well as pedagogy.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
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