Tropical medicine

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Tropical medicine is the branch of medicine that deals with health problems that occur uniquely, are more widespread, or prove more difficult to control in tropical and subtropical regions.

Many infections that are classified as "tropical diseases" used to be endemic in countries located in temperate or even cold areas. That was the case for leprosy, cholera, malaria, polio, measles, hookworm infestations, amoebiasis, among others. The disappearance of those diseases from developed countries was primarily caused by improvements in housing, diet, sanitation, and personal hygiene. Since climate is not the main reason why those infections remain endemic in tropical areas, there is a trend towards renaming this speciality as "Geographic Medicine".

Contents

[edit] Training

The training in Tropical Medicine is quite different between countries. Most of the Tropical doctors design their own training. The Dutch system is unique in the world. The training consists of two clinical years (O&G, Paediatrics or General Surgery) and a three months course at the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT) in Amsterdam.

[edit] Literature

In the course of years, a lot of books are written about the life of tropical doctors. Here is a stubb of a literature list.

  • Jonathan Kaplan. The dressing station, a surgeon's oddysey. Picador, London, 2001.
  • Anne Spoerry. Mama Daktari. The house of books, Vianen, 2000.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

[edit] Training

[edit] Mission

[edit] Weblogs of Tropical Doctors

  • ...

[edit] Other

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