Encephalopathies of unknown cause in children in sub-Saharan Africa

Encephalopathy is a major cause of morbidity in mortality in children in sub-Saharan Africa, yet the underlying cause often remains unknown. This thesis focuses on exploring the aetiology of two types of encephalopathy: severe acute encephalopathy: a clinical syndrome with a heterogeneous group of causes; and Nodding syndrome, a progressive debilitating encephalopathy of unknown – but probably specific – cause. Novel state-of-the-art untargeted diagnostic assays have recently become available which may greatly increase our understanding of the aetiology. This thesis describes the development and application of such assays on clinical samples from encephalopathic children from multiple observational studies.