Blood Parasites

Malaria

bloodparasites — Mon, 14 May 2007 19:04:57 +0000

Another disease caused by a protozoan is malaria, and its vector is a mosquito belonging to genus anopheles. It is the infected female anopheles mosquito which transmits the disease by its bite.

Malaria is a protozoan infection characterized by paroxysms of chills, fever, and sweating, and by anemia, splenomegaly, and a chronic relapsing course.

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Blood Parasites-Dengue

bloodparasites — Mon, 14 May 2007 19:04:11 +0000

A viral infection with Aedes mosquitoes as its vector. It is carried in the blood by a bite of a female Aedes mosquito and brings catastrophic damages to the human body, or in some cases may be mild and needs only symptomatic treatment.

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Blood Parasites-Trypanosomiasis

bloodparasites — Mon, 14 May 2007 19:03:26 +0000

Another group of diseases caused by a protozoan are the African sleeping sickness and Chagas’ disease.The protozoa identified in these diseases fall under the genus Trypanosoma. Trypanosoma brucei variety gambiense and rhodesiense produce African sleeping sickness, the Gambian and Rhodesian trypanosomiasis, while the Trypanosoma cruzi causes Chagas’ disease, responsible for South American trypanosomiasis, seen in South and Central America.

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Leptospirosis

bloodparasites — Mon, 14 May 2007 19:02:49 +0000

A zoonotic infection is a type of infection transmitted from a vertebral animal to man. Among the soonotic infections that is transmitted to man is Leptospirosis. (more…)

Blood Parasites-Leishmaniasis

bloodparasites — Mon, 14 May 2007 19:01:33 +0000

This is a group of parasitic diseases caused by a protozoa under genus Leishmania, and is transmitted by several phlebotomine sandflies. The manifestations may be visceral, mucocutaneous, and cutaneous, and strain of the infecting organism and the immunologic reaction of the hosts apparently can greatly modify the clinical manifestations.

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Blood Parasites

bloodparasites — Mon, 14 May 2007 19:00:08 +0000

Parasites are organisms that live in or on other living organisms and derive its nutriment from the host partly or wholly from it, and somehow exhibits a particular form of adaptation. Microorganisms are known to inhabit in human bodies, in the intestines, in orifices, and sometimes in blood and human organs like liver, brain, and lungs.

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Lymphocytic Choriomeningitis

bloodparasites — Mon, 14 May 2007 06:22:17 +0000

Lymphocytic Choriomeningitis or LCM is an acute viral infection caused by an RNA virus classified as arenavirus, usually appearing as an influenza-like illness or aseptic meningitis, which may be associated with rash, arthritis, orchitis, or parotitis. This type of infection is endemic in rodents, and human infection results most commonly from exposure to dust or food contaminated by the gray house mouse or hamsters, which harbor the virus for life and excrete it in the urine, feces, semen, and nasal secretions. When transmitted by mice, the disease occurs primarily in adults, in the winter. The incubation period ranges from 5 to 10 days after exposure. Fever usually reaching 40 degrees centigrade. Other symptoms include: malaise, weakness, myalgia, especially in the lumbar area, retro-orbital headache, photophobia, anorexia, nausea, and light-headedness. Less common symptoms include sore throat and dysthesia. In the first week of illness, physical findings are few; there may be relative bradycardia and pharyngeal injection without exudates. After 5 days to 3 weeks, the patient may improve for 1 or 2 days. Many patients have a relapse with recurrent fever, headache, skin rashes, swelling of metacarpophalangeal and proximal interphalangeal joints, meningeal signs, orchitis, parotitis, and alopecia of the scalp. Patients with aseptic meningitis almost always recover without sequelae. With encephalitis, up to 33% of the patients have neurologic residua. Laboratory findings include: leukopenia, with white blood cells ranging from 2000 to 3000; thrombocytopenia, with platelets numbering from 50,000 to 100,000, and these findings appear during the first week of illness. (more…)