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Kimberley Aboriginal Medical Services, Nirrumbuk Environmental Health and Services and The Kids Research Institute Australia seek to implement and evaluate a community-led project, funded by the Department of Health, to prevent and manage RHD in a selected high-risk Aboriginal community
The END RHD Communities approach uses community-led, research-backed prevention strategies to tackle Strep A skin and throat infections, acute rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease
Continued progress in controlling RHD requires an understanding of how to improve delivery of regular injections of penicillin - secondary prophylaxis (SP).
The Strep A Translation team aim to understand the epidemiology of Strep A infections in Australia and the world. Alongside this, they explore the implementation of endgame recommendations, health economics and new horizons.
Senior Research Fellow in the Strep A Translation team
Group A Streptococcus (Strep A) is responsible for a significant global health and economic burden. The recent prioritization of Strep A vaccine development by the World Health Organization has prompted global research activities and collaborations. To progress this prioritization, establishment of robust surveillance for Strep A to generate updated regional disease burden estimates and to establish platforms for future impact evaluation is essential.
Group A streptococcal (GAS) infections can trigger an immune-mediated response resulting in acute rheumatic fever. The role of social and environmental risk factors for GAS pharyngitis and skin infections are not well understood.
Acute rheumatic fever (ARF) is a multiorgan inflammatory disorder that results from the body's autoimmune response to pharyngitis or a skin infection caused by Streptococcus pyogenes (Strep A). Acute rheumatic fever mainly affects those in low- and middle-income nations, as well as in indigenous populations in wealthy nations, where initial Strep A infections may go undetected.
Vaccine development and implementation decisions need to be guided by accurate and robust burden of disease data. We developed an innovative systematic framework outlining the properties of such data that are needed to advance vaccine development and evaluation, and prioritize research and surveillance activities.
Rheumatic heart disease (RHD) is a long-term sequela of acute rheumatic fever (ARF), which classically begins after an untreated or undertreated infection caused by Streptococcus pyogenes (Strep A). RHD develops after the heart valves are permanently damaged due to ARF.