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Case Reports
. 2015 Mar 3;7(1):5726.
doi: 10.4081/idr.2015.5726. eCollection 2015 Feb 24.

First detection of human dirofilariasis in South Africa

Krishnee Moodley  1 , Chetna N Govind  1 , Abdool K C Peer  1 , Marissa van der Westhuizen  2 , Dharmesh Parbhoo  3 , Lisa Ming Sun  4 , Desiree C du Plessis  4 , John A Frean  5
Affiliations
Case Reports

First detection of human dirofilariasis in South Africa

Krishnee Moodley et al. Infect Dis Rep. .

Abstract

Humans are occasionally inadvertently infected with dirofilariae, the zoonotic nematodes. We report two cases of human dirofilariasis in South Africa, an area apparently non-endemic for this infection. Dirofilariasis is frequently misdiagnosed, so increased awareness of this entity in areas that are non-endemic is essential for prevention of inappropriate investigations and invasive therapy.

Keywords: Dirofilaria repens; South Africa; ocular dirofilariasis; zoonotic filariasis.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interests: the authors declare no potential conflict of interests.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Cystic lesion on inferomedial aspect of the left eye.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
A) Case 1. Macroscopic view of filarial nematode. Bar=15 mm. B) Case 1. Transverse section of nematode, unstained, showing cuticular ridges (cr). Bar=0.1 mm. C) Case 2. Transverse section of nematode, H&E stain, showing coelomyarian mucles cells (m), lateral chords (lc), female reproductive organs (fro), and intestine (i). Original magn. 100×. D) Case 2. Transverse section, H&E stain, showing coelomyarian muscle cells (m) and prominent cuticular ridges (cr). Original magnification 400×.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Case 1, molecular identification of filarial worm; 1.5% agarose gel. Lane 1: DNA fragment size markers (bp); Lanes 2 and 3: panfilarial sequence (ribosomal intergenic and ITS2 regions); Lanes 4 and 5: D. repens small ribosomal subunit intergenic region, showing 2 bands; Lanes 7 and 8: D. repens cytochrome oxidase subunit I sequence; Lanes 6 and 9: negative PCR controls.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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