ReviewJournal of ultrasound2020
Is there a role for bedside ultrasound in malaria? A survey of the literature.
Review in Journal of ultrasound, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 5 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed, 9 citations in OpenAlex.
- Echocardiographic assessment of cardiac function in children with severe malaria attending two tertiary hospitals in southeast Nigeria.European journal of pediatrics · 2026Observational
- Clinical study on the effect of low-intensity pulsed ultrasound on healing of proximal sesamoid bone fractures in Yili horses.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Experience of an isolated use of low-intensity pulsed ultrasound therapy on fracture healing in established non-unions: a prospective case series.Journal of ultrasound · 2021Article
- Early detection of deep vein thrombosis in patients with coronavirus disease 2019: who to screen and who not to with Doppler ultrasound?Journal of ultrasound · 2021Article
- Point-of-Care Ultrasound for Tropical Disease: Implications for Clinical Decision-Making.The American journal of tropical medicine and hygiene · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
purposePoint-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) has proven utility in the evaluation and treatment of many tropical diseases. Its role in malaria has been studied, but its value for the clinician at the bedside is unclear. Our review aimed at summarizing the existing studies to assess the usefulness, if any, of POCUS in treating malaria.
methodsWe used Boolean operators using keywords "malaria", "acoustic", "ultrasound", "echography", and "ultrasonography" to search PubMed, Scopus, and Science Direct in three languages (Italian, French, and English).
resultsWe found 22 eligible references. Organs explored include the liver, spleen, heart, optic nerve sheath diameter (ONSD), kidney, lungs, and cerebral vasculature. Multiple pathologic findings by ultrasound are reported, but few demonstrate clinical utility. Current studies involve small numbers of patients, and a few trends emerge when studies are compared. The ability to combine study results is limited due to the significant heterogeneity that exists between studies in regards to both methods of evaluation and the reporting of organ pathology and malaria severity. CONCLUSIONS AND ASSESSMENT: A review of the current literature indicates that the use of ultrasound by clinicians adds little to the diagnostic evaluation of patients with malaria. Our review did find that measurements of the spleen, lungs, optic nerve sheath diameter, and cerebral blood flow have potential utility in specific patient populations. Further studies are needed to evaluate whether this utility persists when a larger sample size is used.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.