Society of Tropical Medicine & Infectious Diseases in India

The worldwide epidemiology of travel-related diseases is constantly changing. Depending on destination, 22% to 64% of travelers report some illness; most of these problems are mild, self-limited illnesses such as diarrhea, respiratory infections, and skin disorders. Rates are significantly higher in summer. Approximately 8% of travelers consult a physician either during or after a trip, but less than 1% require hospitalization. Infectious diseases account for up to 10% of the morbidity during travel but only 1% of the deaths, with malaria being the most common disease.

Since travel medicine is an integral part of tropical medicine, our society encourages everyone to ask questions about their travels and related diseases. By simple personal protection, immunization, chemoprophylaxis and pre and post travel examination we can reduce the burden of many diseases and can predict occurrence of new disease in a returning traveller early.

STMIDI recommends a traveller to visit a travel medicine specialist before travel for a structured approach towards prevention of common diseases that are contracted during the travel. Such an approach includes performance of risk assessment; personal protection; administration of vaccines; chemoprophylaxis for malaria (for travellers visiting a malaria endemic zone like the jungle areas), Prevention and treatment of travellers' diarrhoea (counselling, administration of drug kit). For Haj pilgrims cholera and meningococcal meningitis vaccination is mandatory.

Travel Medicine

Links