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Travel Health: Useful Medical Information For Good Health Be |
by:
Eddy De Vos |
The diseases most commonly seen in travellers are diarrhoea, malaria (if you travel inmalaria-infested area), accidents (when travelling by car or swimming), wound infections and sexually transmitted diseases.
- Diarrhoea is caused by contaminated food and drinking-water. You must therefore be careful if your are travelling in poor hygiene conditions.
- Malaria is transmitted by mosquitoes, sofirst thing to do is to protect yourself against these mosquitoes.
- In order to prevent accidents during travelling, it is wise to applysame precautions as those taken at home. In addition, it is very important that all wounds should be thoroughly disinfected in order to avoid infection.
· TRAVELLER’S DIARRHOEA
Many intestinal infections are attributable to infections picked up by mouth or hands. Withlittle care most of these illnesses can be prevented. Hepatitis A, typhoid fever, polio and cholera still occur in countries with poor hygiene, but these diseases are easily prevented.
However,chance is rather large that you will still contractlight and/or nondangerous form of traveller's diarrhoea. Traveller's diarrhoea almost always spontaneously clears up afterfew days, but can nevertheless be irritating. Andrisk to your overall and travel health.
Infirst place measures must be taken against dehydration. Likewise, treatment ofsymptoms must be considered in order to reducenumber of bowel movements and relieve other symptoms such as fever, vomiting and stomach cramps. Sometimesmore serious form of diarrhoea occurs, for which specific treatment with antibiotics is indicated or where hospitalisation or fluid replacement appears unavoidable.
It takes onlyfew basic preventive measures to make your tripsuccess : Total prevention of traveller's diarrhoea is impossible and it is obvious that preventive measures can seldom be strictly followed at all times. But following preventive measures do significantly reducerisk of contracting serious diarrhoea: In order to maintain good travel health wash your hands before eating and avoid (if possible):
- raw vegetables and fruits that you have not peeled yourself
- uncooked or unpasteurized dairy products
- insufficiently cooked sea foods (+ Hepatitis A !) and meat
- “local meals” which do not smell fresh
- ice-cream bought from street merchants (industrial ice straight fromdeep-freeze is probably safe).
Cooked meals should be served hot. The place where you eat is also important. A meal taken fromstall presentsgreater risk thanmeal taken inrestaurant. Avoid restaurants where there arelot of insects.
Avoid tap water and ice-cubes. Bottled water and soft drinks are safe. Watch out for bottle caps that have already been used.
It is very important to disinfect drinking-water on adventure trips. Total sterilisation of drinking water is impossible. The following measures considerably reducecontamination risk and safeguard your travel health:
- Boilingwater is very effective.
- A good alternative is chemical disinfection with chlorine drops (e.g. Hadex®, Drinkwell chloor®; available in sport shops specialized in outdoor activities) or chlorine tablets (Certisil Combina®; chloramine tablets; available atpharmacy). Their effect can be improved by first filtering unclear water. Silver salts (Micropur®, Certisil Argento®) are not very suitable to disinfect water, but they keep disinfected water germ-free forlong time.
For adventurous travellers conscious to travel health it is best to buyportable water-filter. The use of antibiotics in order to prevent diarrhoea before it occurs can be dangerous + Alsouse of other preventive medications is not recommended.
. How to treat diarrhoea?
It is extremely important to consume sufficient liquid and salt in order to prevent dehydration. You can do this by taking salt solutions, but tea with lemon, broth, soft drinks and fruit juice, supplemented with salt crackers are tastier. Commercial salt products are available onmarket (ORS-solution).
Takinganti-diarrhoea preparation (loperamide, e.g. Imodium®) can greatly reducenumber of bowel movements, withconsiderable reduction ofcomplaints asresult. Imodium® may only be used by adults and older children and only for treating ordinary watery diarrhoea: one capsule after every loose movement up tomaximum of four per day.
Antibiotics are indicated :
one. If blood, mucus or pus are present instools.
two. If after twofour to foureight hours, there is no sign of improvement anddiarrhoea is accompanied by fever (above threeeight.five C) or severe abdominal cramps, or if there are more than six stools per twofour hours and especially when these also occur at night.
three. Or if because of travel circumstancesquicker solution is absolutely desirable . Appropriate antibiotics are only to be used on doctor’s prescription
· SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASES
Casual sexual contacts tend to be higher while on holiday abroad. Sexually transmitted diseases, particularly AIDS, form thereforeimportant risk for travellers. Quite often unintentional and unsafe sexual contact takes place under alcohol influence. Prevention while on holiday abroad is no different fromprecautions you take at home. Adequate use ofcondom, preferably bought at home, is absolutely essential. Onlywater-soluble lubricant should be used, but it only offerspartial guarantee (e.g. KY gel). Vaccination against hepatitis B is advised. Always consult your doctor if you think you are at risk, even when there are no symptoms.
· MALARIA (swamp fever, malaria)
Malaria isinfectious disease caused byparasite (called Plasmodium) transmitted bybite ofAnopheles mosquito. There are four different types of which Malaria falciparum ismost dangerous andmost widespread. The incubation period –time betweeninfecting bite andappearance ofdisease – varies from ten days to four weeks (rarely several months).
The symptoms include attacks of fever, but can initially be quite similar to influenza. If adequate treatment is not started in time,attack may sometimes result in death withinfew days.
. Where does malaria occur?
Malaria only occurs in those areas in which Anopheles mosquitoes are present : intropics and inlarge number of subtropical areas. Fromheight of one.fivezerozero to two.fivezerozero m onwards, depending on temperature and climate, Anopheles mosquitoes are either rare or non-existent.
In most big cities there is little or no risk at all of infection, except in Africa wherereal risk exists.
Risk also exists insuburbs ofbig cities in Asia (e.g. in India). Innumber of areasrisk varies according toseason.
. How can malaria be prevented?
It is very important for travel health to avoid mosquito bites :Anopheles mosquito only bites between dusk and dawn, is rather small and hardly makes any noise.
- Inevening wear light-coloured clothing which covers your arms and legs as much as possible. Apply repellent cream withDEET basis (twozero to fivezero%, for children and pregnant women preferably twozero to threezero%) touncovered parts of your body. Repeat this every four to six hours (it will not protect you all night).
Non containing DEET repellents were less examined; Autan-Active. and Mosegor. are however excellent safe products.
- Sleep in rooms that leave no access to mosquitoes, (mosquito nets onsills, electrically-warmed anti-mosquito plates, air-conditioning) or sleep undermosquito net impregnated with permethrine or deltamethrine hung overbed withedges tucked undermattress.
If these measures are carried out correctly,risk of malaria will be reduced by eightzero to ninezero% and travel health is maintained
. The intake of pills as prevention
There is no drug efficient enough to prevent malaria onezerozero%, which means that quite oftencombination of measures is preferable. Alsodrugs used have changed overyears. Moreover,advantages and disadvantages of drugs should be considered againstrisk of malaria infection. These risks are dependent onvisited country, and onregion,season,duration of your stay andkind of trip.
Some people might be troubled byside effects while taking antimalarial drugs. These are usually mild and are not alwaysreason to stop takingpills. Sometimes it may be necessary to change to another type of medication due to intestinal problems, allergic reactions or other intolerance symptoms.
Therefore it isdoctor who can best decide for each individual which drug to use. This explains why individuals fromsame group may end up taking different drugs.
Finally, as no drug is onezerozero% effective in preventing malaria, it is important that ifattack of fever occurs infirst three months after your return fromtropics,malaria infection should be considered aspossibility despitecorrect use ofdrug prescribed.
However, it is reassuring to know that malaria, provided it is recognised in time, is easy to treat without any danger of recurrent attacks. The belief that "once malaria always malaria" is totally untrue.
You can find even more travel health tips innext pages:
DISEASES FOR WHICH VACCINATIONS ARE AVAILABLE: http://www.spain-holidays-advisor.com/vaccination.html
MORE TRAVEL HEALTH TIPS : http://www.spain-holidays-advisor.com/more-travel-tips.html
CAUTION: The information provided here should not be used during any medical emergency or fordiagnosis or fortreatment of any medical condition. A licensed physician should be consulted for any and all medical conditions. Call nineoneone for all medical emergencies.
AboutAuthor: Eddy De Vos isowner of http://www.spain-holidays-advisor.com/,
a website about travel and Spain. It contains usefull tips for your next trip, be it to Spain or anywhere else inworld.
Of course if you are planningtrip to Spain there is no better place to start than there
Source: www.isnare.com |
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