Search
In late 2022, six-year-old Megan Hutton was living the dream of many kids her age as she celebrated being named runner-up champion athlete at her school sports carnival.
The Institute has become one of the world’s leading Strep A hubs, with multiple teams working in the Institute’s END RHD Program, headed by Associate Professor Asha Bowen, working to understand how Strep A works and find better ways to prevent and control the diseases it causes.
Aboriginal health is everyone's business. The needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families and kids is integrated into all relevant areas of our work. Improving the health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander kids and families is an overarching priority for every team at The Kids.
More than 3,000 skin checks have been undertaken as part of a large clinical trial in WA’s Kimberley region aimed at halving the burden of skin sores in school-aged Aboriginal children.
Group A Streptococcus (GAS) causes pharyngitis (sore throat) and impetigo (skin sores) GAS pharyngitis triggers rheumatic fever (RF) with epidemiological evidence supporting that GAS impetigo may also trigger RF in Australian Aboriginal children. Understanding the concurrent burden of these superficial GAS infections is critical to RF prevention. This pilot study aimed to trial tools for concurrent surveillance of sore throats and skins sore for contemporary studies of RF pathogenesis including development of a sore throat checklist for Aboriginal families and pharynx photography.
Impetigo is a highly contagious bacterial infection of the superficial layer of skin. Impetigo is caused by group A Streptococcus (Strep A) and Staphylococcus aureus, alone or in combination, with the former predominating in many tropical climates. Strep A impetigo occurs mainly in early childhood, and the burden varies worldwide. It is an acute, self-limited disease, but many children experience frequent recurrences that make it a chronic illness in some endemic settings.
Bacterial skin infections and scabies disproportionately affect children in resource-poor countries as well as underprivileged children in high-income countries. Atopic dermatitis is a common childhood dermatosis that predisposes to bacterial skin infection.
Jonathan Asha Dylan Rosemary Janessa Jeffrey Carapetis AM Bowen Barth Wyber Pickering Cannon AM MBBS FRACP FAFPHM PhD FAHMS BA MBBS DCH FRACP PhD
Group A β-haemolytic Streptococcus (GAS), a Gram-positive bacterium, causes skin, mucosal and systemic infections. Repeated GAS infections can lead to autoimmune diseases acute rheumatic fever (ARF) and rheumatic heart disease (RHD). Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in Australia have the highest rates of ARF and RHD in the world.
Debbie Susan Palmer Prescott BSc BND PhD MBBS BMedSci PhD FRACP Head, Nutrition in Early Life Honorary Research Fellow debbie.palmer@uwa.edu.au