Pediatric Visceral Leishmanisis in the Southwest Part of Iran: a Study of 215 Cases

Objective: To study the epidemiological, clinical charactristics and laboratory findings of visceral leishmaniasis (VL) in children. Design: It is a retrospective study, hospital records of all children with diagnosis of VL were reviewed from 1991 through 2003. Setting: Hospitals affiliated to Ahvaz Jondi-Shapour University of Medical Sciences in the southwestern part of Iran. Subjects: Two hundreds and fifteen patients (153 males and 62 females) were enrolled in the study. Results: The mean age of the patients was 31 ± 22 months. Fever and splenomegaly were present in >95% of the patients and hepatomegaly and lymphadenopathy in 76% and 3.7% of cases, respectively. Common laboratory findings were anemia, leukopenia and thrombocytopenia.All patients were treated with meglumine antimoniate.Relapse were observed in 4% of the patients and fatality rate was 5%. Conclusions: Visceral leishmaniasis is endemic in the southwestern part of Iran. The clinical profile of the disease is typical of the Mediterranean infantile form.