Introduction lecture

Loading...

From the course by University of Amsterdam

Ebola: Essential Knowledge for Health Professionals

121 ratings

University of Amsterdam

Ebola: Essential Knowledge for Health Professionals

121 ratings

March 2014 marked the starting point of the largest outbreak of Ebola virus disease in history. Although the disease seems to be on a decrease, we are not there yet and new outbreaks will surely emerge. New efforts to combat the outbreak are necessary. This is why we developed this online course about Ebola, targeted at health professionals across the world. In this course you will cover the fundamental knowledge any health professional should have with expected or confirmed cases or a general interest in the Ebola disease. You will discuss the epidemiology of the disease, its pathophysiology and transmission, the clinical presentation including differential diagnosis and confirmation of disease. You will also discuss the general therapeutic approach to the care of Ebola suspected or confirmed patients and discuss the novel vaccine and drug developments. As the Ebola crisis continues to rage through the affected areas, we need health professionals like yourself to be informed and involved. This course is developed in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Amsterdam, the University Medical Center Utrecht (Julius Center/Julius Global Health), Elevate Health, Médecins Sans Frontières and the Lion Heart Foundation.

From the lesson

Therapeutic approaches

The primary objective of this learning unit is to provide you with sufficient knowledge on how to fight the Ebola epidemic from a clinical perspective: how is Ebola virus disease (EVD) treated and how can transmission of the virus be prevented? In addition, this unit gives an overview of the experimental therapeutic options and vaccines.

Introduction lecture0:00

Meet the Instructors

Martin P. Grobusch
Joyce L. Browne
MD, PhD
UMC Utrecht, Utrecht University

[MUSIC]

Welcome to our teaching unit on Treatment and Prevention of Ebola Virus Disease.

Learning objectives are to consider relevant treatment strategies for

Ebola virus disease, to highlight the current state of development of

specific anti-Ebola medications and their general working mechanisms,

to discuss preventative strategies and

the logic behind them and to look into the current state

of development of long-term preventative approaches, for example, vaccines.

With regard to treatment, the mainstay of therapy up-to-date is supportive care.

However, in the future, improved supportive care,

specific anti- Ebola viral drugs and monoclonal antibodies

will come into the picture, and this will be discussed in this module.

With regard to prevention, personal protection is of paramount importance,

of course, and in the future, we hope that we will have vaccines at hand.

Generally the current supportive care is

the only established way of

supporting our patients in order to recover from Ebola virus disease.

We will discuss the various supportive care strategies.

Most important is certainly rehydration.

Most important is replenishment of electrolytes, etcetera.,

and then we will look into the various other supportive means of care.

Experimental treatment approaches

are consisting of the use of blood products from reconvalescents.

This is nothing really new.

This has been experimented with on a much smaller scale naturally during

smaller outbreaks in the past already and

this approach is now revitalized and studied most thoroughly.

And then of course the development of specific anti Ebola drugs and

antibodies will be discussed.

What experimental drugs are out there.

Well, there are a couple anti-retrovirals with specific effect or

particular good effect, virocidal effect on Ebola.

A virus, for example, Favi/piravir, comes into the picture here, that will be

discussed in detail, and then there are a couple of other drugs and monoclonal

antibodies which we will discuss in detail which are under development.

Mind you, this is an extremely rapidly evolving field at present, and

all our information is up to date at the moment of producing the course,

but that may, in some details, very quickly be outdated and

superseded by more data becoming available.

Prospects for vaccination development, for vaccine development actually.

There are a couple of vaccines which have been fast tracked now from and

macaque animal, study stage actually into humans.

There are a couple of phase one trials on their way not only

in Africa but also in certain European settings.

Several of them are already reaching completion in their first stages,

and we expect first phase one study results to become

available very, very quickly, either still before the course goes,

course goes online or within the next two or three couple of months actually.

Prevention, personal protection, of course is paramount.

Here we discuss mainly treatment,

but we also want to lay the link again to prevention, personal protection.

However, we are going to discuss this of course in much more detail in

some of the practical learning and experience sharing units actually.

Our conclusion will be that

the current treatment approach is mainly supportive actually.

We will, that there are a couple of experimental treatments in

development that personal protection is paramount and

that the vaccine development has now reached a critical speed.

And at least before this outbreak, the current outbreak will come to an end or

ease off, there will be phase one data at least available for

a range of potential vaccines actually.

And as well, and as always,

our learning until will be supplemented by ample reading material.

Thank you very much for your attention.

Explore our Catalog

Join for free and get personalized recommendations, updates and offers.

Coursera provides universal access to the world’s best education, partnering with top universities and organizations to offer courses online.

© 2018 Coursera Inc. All rights reserved.

Download on the App Store

Get it on Google Play