Sajid Soofi
Dr. Soofi is a distinguished professor who integrates his roles as a clinician, researcher, and public health scientist, demonstrating exceptional expertise in each field and extensive experience in hospital and community-based research. His passion lies in improving maternal, neonatal, child, and adolescent health, focusing on nutrition and infectious diseases.
Dr. Soofi has a proven track record of leading high-impact research initiatives. He has spearheaded multiple clinical trials and large-scale national and international nutrition surveys & program evaluations that have garnered significant attention. A key focus of his research is the integration of interventions for newborns and children, especially nutrition and malnutrition, into existing health system programs. The robust evidence generated through these trials has demonstrably influenced policy and program development, improving MNCH (maternal, neonatal, and child health) survival rates and reducing malnutrition in mothers and children.
Dr. Soofi's research excellence is evident in his success in securing 65 highly competitive research grants. He fosters strong collaborations with leading funding agencies and academic institutions, further solidifying his research impact. His achievements are further validated by prestigious research excellence awards and over 230 publications in top-tier international journals.
Phone: +923002769398
Dr. Soofi has a proven track record of leading high-impact research initiatives. He has spearheaded multiple clinical trials and large-scale national and international nutrition surveys & program evaluations that have garnered significant attention. A key focus of his research is the integration of interventions for newborns and children, especially nutrition and malnutrition, into existing health system programs. The robust evidence generated through these trials has demonstrably influenced policy and program development, improving MNCH (maternal, neonatal, and child health) survival rates and reducing malnutrition in mothers and children.
Dr. Soofi's research excellence is evident in his success in securing 65 highly competitive research grants. He fosters strong collaborations with leading funding agencies and academic institutions, further solidifying his research impact. His achievements are further validated by prestigious research excellence awards and over 230 publications in top-tier international journals.
Phone: +923002769398
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Methods: We comprehensively searched PubMed, CINAHL, the Cochrane Library, ClinicalTrials.gov, the World Health Organization (WHO) International Clinical Trials Registry Platform, and Scopus until 20 July 2023 for studies published after 1990 assessing the efficacy of LORS in acute and persistent diarrhoea in children under 10 years of age. Meta-analysis was conducted using the RevMan software. We performed log approximation for all the values for an outcome when studies reported arithmetic and geometric means per the Cochrane Handbook. We otherwise used the Cochrane Risk of Bias II tool to assess the risk of bias in individual studies, and assessed the quality of evidence using the
Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations approach. This review was commissioned by the WHO for revision of guidelines for childhood diarrhoea.
Results: For the comparison of LORS to standard ORS in acute diarrhoea, our findings suggest that there was a significant decrease in the duration of diarrhoea (mean difference (MD)=−0.28; 95% confidence interval (CI)=−0.41, −0.15; moderate certainty of evidence), stool output (MD=−0.25; 95% CI=−0.35, −0.16; very low certainty of evidence), and ORS intake (MD= −0.18; 95% CI=−0.28, −0.07; moderate certainty of evidence) in patients receiving LORS. There was a comparable effect on the number of patients cured within five days, treatment failure, and frequency of unscheduled intravenous therapy (risk ratio (RR)=0.77; 95% CI=0.72, 9.38; low certainty of evidence). For persistent diarrhoea, there was a significant decrease in duration of diarrhoea (MD=−30.60; 95% CI=−48.95, −12.25), stool output (MD=−14.00; 95% CI=−26.63, −1.37), and ORS intake (MD=−21.40; 95% CI=−41.01, −1.79), while there was a comparable effect on the number of patients cured.
Conclusion: Our findings suggest that LORS should continue to be recommended in children under the age of 10 years with acute watery or persistent diarrhoea and upholds the current WHO recommendations.
Methods: We searched PubMed, the Cochrane Library, Scopus, CINAHL, ClinicalTrials.gov, and World Health Organization (WHO) International Clinical Trials Registry Platform from inception until 31 July 2023 for studies published from year 2000 onwards that assessed the use of zinc in the management of acute and persistent diarrhoea in children aged less than 10 years. We conducted the meta-analysis in Cochrane's RevMan software, determined risk of bias in individual studies using the Risk of Bias 2 (RoB 2) tool, and assessed the quality of evidence through the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach. This review was commissioned by the WHO for revision of their guidelines for childhood diarrhoea management.
Results: We included 38 RCTs in this systematic review. Our findings suggest that, in children with acute diarrhoea, zinc supplementation resulted in a greater proportion of children who recovered from diarrhoea at last follow-up (risk ratio (RR) = 1.07; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.03, 1.1; moderate certainty of evidence) and a reduction in the duration of diarrhoea (mean difference (MD) = -13.27 hours; 95% CI = -17.66, -8.89; moderate certainty of evidence) when compared to placebo. A significant number of children in the zinc group compared to placebo experienced vomiting (RR = 1.46; 95% CI = 1.22, 1.76; moderate certainty of evidence), however, there were few vomiting episodes in low-dose zinc group compared to high-dose (RR = 0.80; 95% CI = 0.72, 0.89; moderate certainty of evidence). In children with persistent diarrhoea, zinc supplementation led to a greater proportion of children who recovered from diarrhoea (RR = 1.75; 95% CI = 1.34, 2.30; low certainty of evidence). The low certainty of evidence ratings were mostly due to high heterogeneity among the studies.
Conclusions: Zinc should continue to be recommended in children under the age of 10 years with acute or persistent diarrhoea, but moderate certainty of evidence concludes that the dose of zinc should be reduced. However, further multi-country randomised clinical trials are required with a direct comparison to assess the appropriate dosage, duration and adverse effects.
Methods: We searched PubMed, CINAHL, the Cochrane Library, ClinicalTrials.gov, the World Health Organization (WHO) International Clinical Trials Registry Platform, and Scopus from inception until 20 July 2023 for studies published after the year 2000 assessing antibiotics vs placebo in acute and persistent diarrhoea and/or blood in stools in children less than 10 years of age. We conducted a meta-analysis for the included studies, assessed them using the Risk of Bias 2 tool, and evaluated their quality of evidence through the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations (GRADE) framework. This review was commissioned by WHO for revision of their guidelines for childhood diarrhoea management.
Results: We included five randomised controlled trials (RCTs) for acute watery diarrhoea and no study for bloody diarrhoea. Our findings suggest that there is a significant increase in clinical cure (risk ratio (RR) = 2.28; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.52, 3.41; low certainty evidence) and parasitological cure (RR = 2.86; 95% CI = 1.72 to 4.74; low certainty evidence) among children with acute watery diarrhoea in the antibiotic group when compared to the placebo group. The duration of diarrhoea (in hours) was significantly reduced (mean difference = -24.90; 95% CI = -34.09, -15.71; low certainty evidence) in the intervention group, while the effect on all-cause mortality (RR = 0.71; 95% CI = 0.40, 1.27; moderate certainty evidence) and the need for intravenous fluid infusion (RR = 0.50; 95% CI = 0.05, 5.17; very low certainty evidence) were comparable between the two groups.
Conclusions: In children under 10 years of age suffering from acute watery or persistent diarrhoea, antibiotics led to an apparent increase in cure rates. However, considering the low certainty of evidence, low number of studies with small sample sizes, and the fact that most studies were conducted in a single country, further investigation and cautious interpretation are warranted, as is a large multi-country RCT that would allow for firmer conclusions.