Abstract

DETECTION OF MALARIAL PARASITE BY BLOOD SMEAR EXAMINATION AND ANTIGEN DETECTION: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

At present about 100 countries in the world are considered malarious, is thought to kill between 1.1 and 2.7 million people worldwide each year, of which about 1 million are children under the age of 5 years in these areas. Under ideal circumstances, the clinical suspicion of malaria would be confirmed by a laboratory test that is simple to perform, rapid, sensitive, specific and expensive. At the present time, no such test exists. The most common test for malaria diagnosis remains the microscopic examination of giemsa or the fields – stained blood smears. The test is based on the detection of Plasmodium falciparum specific histidine rich protein ii (hrp) and a pan malarial species specific enzyme aldolose, produced by the respective parasites and released into the blood and the test is based on immune chromatography, the test is highly sensitive. Method: In this study included 100 patients, 60% of patients had history suggestive of malaria, another 40% gave the history of irregular fever; For each patient peripheral blood sample was collected, thin and thick smear blood films were made immediately after blood collection, stained with Leishman stain and examined for malaria parasite by light microscopy. Results: The blood films results indicated that 40 (20%) patients were infected with malaria and the rest 171 (85.5%) were malaria negative. Among positive patients Plasmodium vivax was detected in 24 cases (60%) and Plasmodium falciparum in 10 cases (31%) and 6 cases mixed infection (PV + PF) (15%) correspondingly, the Para HIT Test results indicated that 29 (14.5%) of the patient sample were positive for malaria parasites and 171 (85.5) were malaria negative out 29 patients cases. Infection with Plasmodium vivax accounted for 17 (58.6%) while infection with Plasmodium falciparum accounted for 9 (25%) and 3 (1.3%) with mixed infection of Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum.

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