ArticleMalaria journal2015
Assessing the quality of anti-malarial drugs from Gabonese pharmacies using the MiniLab®: a field study.
Article in Malaria journal, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- Characterizing Medicine Quality by Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient Levels: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis across Low- and Middle-Income Countries.The American journal of tropical medicine and hygiene · 2022Pooled it
- Global research on artemisinin and its derivatives: Perspectives from patents.Pharmacological research · 2020Pooled it
- Prevalence and Estimated Economic Burden of Substandard and Falsified Medicines in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.JAMA network open · 2018Pooled it
- Anti-malarial medicine quality field studies and surveys: a systematic review of screening technologies used and reporting of findings.Malaria journal · 2017Pooled it
- Quality evaluation of cephalexin, cefuroxime, and ceftriaxone medicines marketed in Addis Ababa city, Ethiopia with three tier level approach and anti-microbial assays.BMC pharmacology & toxicology · 2025Article
- Slow clearance of histidine-rich protein-2 in Gabonese with uncomplicated malaria.Microbiology spectrum · 2024Observational
- Quality assessment of common anti-malarial medicines marketed in Gambella, National Regional State, South Western-Ethiopia.Malaria journal · 2024Article
- Prevalence of substandard, falsified, unlicensed and unregistered medicine and its associated factors in Africa: a systematic review.Journal of pharmaceutical policy and practice · 2024Review
- Article
- An open-source smartphone app for the quantitative evaluation of thin-layer chromatographic analyses in medicine quality screening.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- Emerging Antimicrobial Drug Resistance in Africa and Latin America: Search for Reasons.Risk management and healthcare policy · 2022Review
- Article
- Field detection devices for screening the quality of medicines: a systematic review.BMJ global health · 2018Article
- Diagnostic Accuracy of Global Pharma Health Fund Minilab™ in Assessing Pharmacopoeial Quality of Antimicrobials.The American journal of tropical medicine and hygiene · 2018Article
- Assessment of the quality of anti-tuberculosis medicines in Almaty, Kazakhstan, 2014.The international journal of tuberculosis and lung disease : the official journal of the International Union against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease · 2017Article
- Do anti-malarials in Africa meet quality standards? The market penetration of non quality-assured artemisinin combination therapy in eight African countries.Malaria journal · 2017Article
- The diagnostic accuracy of the hand-held Raman spectrometer for the identification of anti-malarial drugs.Malaria journal · 2016Article
- Cost savings of paper analytical devices (PADs) to detect substandard and falsified antibiotics: Kenya case study.Medicine access @ point of careArticle
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
11 authors at 5 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundRecent studies alluded to the alarming scale of poor anti-malarial drug quality in malaria-endemic countries, but also illustrated the major geographical gaps in data on anti-malarial drug quality from endemic countries. Data are particularly scarce from Central Africa, although it carries the highest burden of malaria. The aim of this medicine quality field survey was to determine the prevalence of poor-quality anti-malarial drugs in Gabon.
methodsA field survey of the quality of anti-malarial drugs in Gabonese pharmacies was conducted using the Global Pharma Health Fund Minilab(®) tests, following the Medicine Quality Assessment Reporting Guidelines. Anti-malarial drugs were purchased randomly from selected pharmacies in Gabon. Semi-quantitative thin-layer chromatography (TLC) and disintegration testing were carried out to measure the concentration of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). The samples failing the TLC test were analysed by high-performance liquid chromatography. Following the collection of anti-malarial drugs, a street survey was conducted to understand where people purchase their anti-malarial drugs.
resultsA total of 432 samples were purchased from 41 pharmacies in 11 cities/towns in Gabon. The prevalence of poor-quality anti-malarial drugs was 0.5% (95% CI 0.08-1.84%). Two out of 432 samples failed the MiniLab(®) semi-quantitative TLC test, of which a suspected artemether-lumefantrine (AL) sample was classified as falsified and one sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (SP) sample as substandard. High performance liquid chromatography with ultraviolet photo diode array detection analysis confirmed the absence of APIs in the AL sample, and showed that the SP sample did contain the stated APIs but the amount was half the stated dose. Of the people interviewed, 92% (187/203) purchased their anti-malarial drugs at a pharmacy.
conclusionUsing the GPHF Minilab(®), the prevalence of poor-quality anti-malarial drugs is far lower than anticipated. The findings emphasize the need for randomized and robust sampling methods in order to collect representative data on anti-malarial drug quality.
trial registrationNTR4341 (Dutch Trial Registry).
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