Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Lan of HCMCity's Pham Ngoc Thach Hospital is among three people recently honouredby the World Health Organisation for their contribution to theprevention of tuberculosis (TB).
The others includeAnne Lenaerts, a professor at Colorado University in the US, andPatience Oduor, who works for a TB vaccine research programme in Kenya.
The awards have been given as part of WHO's activities to mark World TBDay, March 24, which this year focus on individuals around the worldwho are involved in finding new ways to stop TB, and succeed, and can serve as an inspiration to others.
Lan, 54, head of the hospital's microbiology department, has workedwith her staff to develop the quality and effectiveness of themicrobiology test centre.
Her group has also been involved in expanding grassroots TB testing andcare programmes in the southern region, providing many people living inremote areas access to TB diagnosis and treatment as well asintegrating TB care into health systems.
Lan has also been honoured for her innovation in diagnosis ofdrug-resistant TB which has helped cut the diagnosis time from up tofive months to just one or two days.
Lan began her research in 2007 amidst many challenges and within twoyears, the National TB Prevention Programme adopted her new method.
According to WHO, fully a third of the world's population is infectedwith TB. It is working to reduce the prevalence rate and cut themorbidity rate by half by 2015.
In Vietnam, the disease continues to spread due to a shortage of humanresources and failure to detect new cases during 2007-09.
Around 5,000 people develop multi-drug-resistant TB every year.
The lack of experience among hospital staff, sub-standard medicalfacilities and lack of cooperation between public and private healthcare units are blamed for this.
But the National TB Prevention Programme reported that nearly 90percent of patients receiving proper treatment recover completely.
The programme will implement DOTS (Directly observed treatment, shortcourse) this year, which it hopes will increase the rate of detectionand improve treatment methods./.
The others includeAnne Lenaerts, a professor at Colorado University in the US, andPatience Oduor, who works for a TB vaccine research programme in Kenya.
The awards have been given as part of WHO's activities to mark World TBDay, March 24, which this year focus on individuals around the worldwho are involved in finding new ways to stop TB, and succeed, and can serve as an inspiration to others.
Lan, 54, head of the hospital's microbiology department, has workedwith her staff to develop the quality and effectiveness of themicrobiology test centre.
Her group has also been involved in expanding grassroots TB testing andcare programmes in the southern region, providing many people living inremote areas access to TB diagnosis and treatment as well asintegrating TB care into health systems.
Lan has also been honoured for her innovation in diagnosis ofdrug-resistant TB which has helped cut the diagnosis time from up tofive months to just one or two days.
Lan began her research in 2007 amidst many challenges and within twoyears, the National TB Prevention Programme adopted her new method.
According to WHO, fully a third of the world's population is infectedwith TB. It is working to reduce the prevalence rate and cut themorbidity rate by half by 2015.
In Vietnam, the disease continues to spread due to a shortage of humanresources and failure to detect new cases during 2007-09.
Around 5,000 people develop multi-drug-resistant TB every year.
The lack of experience among hospital staff, sub-standard medicalfacilities and lack of cooperation between public and private healthcare units are blamed for this.
But the National TB Prevention Programme reported that nearly 90percent of patients receiving proper treatment recover completely.
The programme will implement DOTS (Directly observed treatment, shortcourse) this year, which it hopes will increase the rate of detectionand improve treatment methods./.
