Epidemic-prone diseases

The WHO IMAI tools have been used in the case management of H1N1 during the 2009 pandemic, during Ugandan Ebola and Marburg outbreaks, the West African Ebola outbreak of 2014-2016, and now during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, a specific training module was developed to strengthen the clinician’s role in disease surveillance and response, to help improve the detection and rapid response to outbreaks by priority epidemic-prone diseases. 

  • Clinician’s role in disease surveillance and response

    • This training module includes an introduction to the national disease surveillance system and the priority notifiable diseases, with emphasis only on  immediately reportable diseases with epidemic potential; practice in forming a differential diagnosis, including notifiable diseases and other conditions, using the IMAI District Clinician Manual (DCM) as a tool; infection prevention and control for the clinical team including choice of  IPC precautions by suspected disease;  use of standard case definitions and clinical management summaries for each notifiable disease in the DCM; laboratory testing; and hospital preparation for an outbreak. The disease sections then vary by country adaptation, based on their epidemiology and current disease control priorities.  Most have included SARI and VHF.

  • Influenza- response to the H1N1 pandemic and Pandemic Influenza Preparedness

    • The need to guide health workers to manage patients with severe influenza with respiratory distress and septic shock in hospitals without an ICU during the H1NI pandemic in 2009 spurred the completion of the WHO IMAI District Clinician Manual and development of the Quick Check+ training curricula then its use in Uganda from 2009 onward. 

  • COVID-19 and other severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) outbreaks  

    • The Alliance’s work with WHO South-East Asia Regional Office to adapt the Quick Check+ training tools and the IMAI District Clinician Manual has produced a full set of SEARO IMAI SARI tools with a focus on COVID-19. Remote trainings were provided for Myanmar, Timor-Leste, Cox’s Bazar. A six-country training of trainers is currently ongoing for Bangladesh, Bhutan, Indonesia, Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. 

  • Ebola (EVD)

    • The Alliance case management tools have helped support Uganda’s response to Ebola and Marburg and the Ebola response in West Africa 2014-2016.Working with the Ugandan MOH and WHO HSE/PED, the Alliance was contracted to develop pocket guides for case management of Ebola and other viral hemorrhagic fevers with person-to-person transmission, first for Uganda, then for the West African outbreak, as well as develop the WHO Ebola Clinical Team training and support its implementation.