SP Compliance Analysis

Analysis of national survey data carried out in 2007, stated the future hope of provision of second dose of SP for IPT in Tanzania from 60% coverage to 80% coverage by 2013 (Ritah, 2012 cited Eijk et al, 2011).

There are some factors that affect SP compliance, such factors classified as a drug induced, pregnant women induced, health system related and health providers induced. The commonest drug induced factors that may lead to poor compliance include the SP related side effects. The side effects reported so far are Steven Johnson Syndrome (burning of the skin), abortion, dizziness, and fever, body weakening and gastrointestinal disturbances (Ritah, 2012 cited Mubyazi et al, 2005). Patient factors such as lack of knowledge on how to use SP

The sulfadoxine is used in combination with Pyrimethamine (500mg of sulfadoxine and 25mg of pyrimethamine) for prophylaxis and treatment of malaria due to Plasmodium falciparum (Patrick, 2010 cited William and Petri, 2001). Sulfadoxine has structural analogs of p – amino benzoic acid (PABA) which inhibits dihydrofolic acid synthesis by inhibiting an enzyme called dihydropteroate synthetase, which has a vital role in the conversion of PABA to folic acid. Pyrimethamine is an antagonist to folic acid, with similar mechanism of action with trimethoprim. Pyrimethamine inhibits the reduction of dihydrofolic acid to tetrahydrofolic acid. Pyrimethamine interferes with tetrahydrofolic acid synthesis in malaria

There is a positive correlation between antenatal anaemia with low birth weight and high infant mortality. It has been observed that putting an effective anti malaria drugs into consideration while pregnancy reduces the frequency of low birth weight and as well as infant mortality rate (Ogbodo et al, 2009 cited Steketee et al, 1996, Verhoeff et al, 1998, Kayentao et al, 2005). As intermittent preventive treatment (IPT) is an effective prevention of malaria in pregnancy, the full dose of the SP is administered at defined intervals. Intermittent preventive treatment is concluded as an effective approach for malaria control (Ogbodo et al, 2009 cited Kayentao et al, 2005, Falade et al, 2007). Although the use of insecticide treated net indicates the potential efficiency in the control of mosquito bites, pregnant women still not find it easy to be under net for more than 8 hours a day, therefore, an issue for complete protection of malaria does not arise (Ogbodo et al, 2009 cited Nwagha et al, 2009). However, some parts of Africa replaced chloroquine (CQ) with SP as first line treatment for malaria, but SP shows the remarkable failure rate (Ogbodo et al, 2009 cited Briand et al, 2007). Having age implicated as epidemiological studies, it has shown that malaria prevalent in pregnancy is higher in younger than older age – groups