By way of introduction to the trip let me give you some background first...
I am currently a Doctor, Clinical Microbiologist and state registered Clinical Scientist working full time at the Scottish Meningococcal and Pneumococcal Reference Laboratory (SMPRL) based at Stobhill Hospital. I am responsible for both routine clinical laboratory work and all the research conducted at SMPRL with Dr Giles Edwards who is the director of SMPRL. The SMPRL is a national laboratory which aids diagnosis and characterisation of three organisms which cause a wide range of diseases. These three organisms are Neisseria meningitidis, Streptococcus pneumoniae and Haemophilus influenzae. We provide this service through the NHS which is funded by the Scottish Executive via the Health Protection Scotland (HPS) to all the diagnostic laboratories throughout Scotland. The other member of the team who is going to Bolivia with me is Dr Donald Inverarity he is at present a Clinical Research Fellow based at the Pneumococcal Research Group led by Professor Tim Mitchell at the University of Glasgow. He has previously trained as a Consultant Medical Microbiologist at Glasgow Royal Infirmary.
Both of our laboratories work on research concerning the bacteria called Streptococcus pneumoniae which is a leading cause of meningitis, blood poisoning (septicaemia), pneumonia and ear infections in children and adults globally. Our research is often complimentary and we work together on many projects. Whereas much is known about who Streptococcus pneumonaie (also called pneumcoccus) affects in developed countries like Scotland and how sensitive it is to antibiotics virtually nothing is known about this in most developing countries and very little is known about it in Bolivia. These infections can be preventable with vaccines but again the vaccines tend only to be readily available in developed countries.
The connection with the Meningitis Association Scotland (MAS) was established several years ago with (SMPRL) and MAS been extremely generous with supported funds for laboratory equipment and computers etc. I should say that funding for all the routine work that SMPRL does for laboratories in Scotland is funded by Health Protection Scotland but research projects especially of this nature often require funding from other sources.
The connection with Bolivia comes through a friend and colleague of Dr Inverarity, Dr Diego Santana-Hernandez. Diego is from Tenerife who trained in ear, nose and throat surgery in Edinburgh and then general practice in the Scottish borders. Diego was invited to Bolivia to perform health checks on children by a Scottish missionary teacher working in the Beni region of Bolivia who he later married and settled in Bolivia. He now has responsibility for performing hearing checks on thousands of children in the Beni region as well as providing primary health care. He has started a medical missionary project called Foundation Totai (yes its spelt with an "i" not "l") and they are about to complete the building of a new health centre on the outskirts of the city of Trinidad where there is virtually no other healthcare and where they have been working from a house for over a year.
However about 18 months ago we realized that much of the childhood deafness due to chronic "glue ear" Diego was trying to treat and prevent was most likely caused by the bacteria Streptococcus pneumoniae which we work with in Glasgow and that with funding we could utilize the facilities at SMPRL to do all the background work required before possibly introducing a vaccination programme to prevent it in the region. We have also been in contact with the Bolivian national reference laboratory called "laboratorio nacional de referencia en bacteriologia clinica" and are hoping to work in close co-operation with them.
Dr. Inverarity and myself plan to travel to Trinidad in the Beni region of Bolivia in early June 2007 to start the laboratory work in co-operation with a local private laboratory which the Foundation Totai staff use while Dr Santana collects swabs from the throats of the children he sees as part of the school health checks for us to culture the bacteria from. We are not sure how long this will take to complete at present but suspect at least two months to complete the work in Bolivia. We will then ship the bacteria back to Glasgow for further analysis at SMPRL to define which antibiotics the bacteria are sensitive to and which subtypes of the bacteria are commonly seen and which should be covered by any vaccine used. The isolates will also be useful in future vaccine research.
My contact details are:
Greater Glasgow & Clyde NHS
Scottish Meningococcal and Pneumococcal Research Laboratory,
House on the Hill, Stobhill General Hospital,
133 Balornock Road,
Glasgow,
G21 3UW
0141 201 3836
Dr Mathew Diggle
