During the 6 year period from January 1980 to December 1985 44 patients with infection of the central nervous system by Gnathostoma spinigerum or Angiostrongylus cantonensis were admitted to the Division of Neurology, Ramathibodi Hospital, Bangkok, Thailand. In 16 patients the diagnosis could be confirmed serologically by means of ELISA techniques. In gnathostomiasis encephalitis, myelitis, rad...

Gnathostomiasis is a typical fish-borne parasitic zoonosis. Gnathostoma spinigerum has long been considered the only species to cause human infection. Because of the distribution of this species and the eating habits of the people, gnathostomiasis was thought an unique parasitic disease in Asia, especially in Thailand and Japan. Around the 1970s, however, the presence of this disease was report...

Gnathostoma spinigerum is a common human tissue parasite in Thailand. The swamp eel is the major intermediate or paratenic host for this parasite. The high prevalence of the infective third stage larvae (L3) of this parasite in the rainy season has been noted in previous studies. During June 1999 (rainy season), we performed a cross-sectional survey of the prevalence and the intensity of G. spi...

Human gnathostomiasis is an infection caused mainly by Gnathostoma spinigerum, a nematode. Infected humans can present with various clinical manifestations. Serology is the criterion standard for diagnosing gnathostomiasis, whereas MR imaging represents a complementary tool for assessing severity and extent of disease. We report two definite cases of gnathostomiasis that were confirmed by the i...

Infections with larvae and immature adults of the nematode Gnathostoma spinigerum, acquired by eating raw fish, are of frequent occurrence in Eastern countries:’ in Thailand recurrent migratory cutaneous swellings are usually pathognomonic of this infection. The parasites have been observed emerging from the skin,2 and from natural openings such as the vagina and urethral orifice. Some have bee...

The present study reports a human case of cutaneous gnathostomiasis with recurrent migratory nodule and persistent eosinophilia in China. A 52-year-old woman from Henan Province, central China, presented with recurrent migratory reddish swelling and subcutaneous nodule in the left upper arm and on the back for 3 months. Blood examination showed eosinophila (21.2%), and anti-sparganum antibodies...

INTRA-OCULAR helminthiasis is very rare in temperate regions (Ashton, 1960) and comparatively rare in the tropics. Invasion of the human eye by Gnathostoma spinigerum is rarer still, although many cases in remote and backward areas may have gone unreported. The most recent was that reported from Burma by Ko Gyi (1960). Gnathostoma spinigerum was first recovered from a gastric tumour in the tige...

This study investigated the effects of albendazole (ABZ) on the ultrastructure of Gnathostoma spinigerum advanced third-stage larvae. Two groups of experimentally infected mice received 60 or 90 mg/kg ABZ orally once a day for 21 consecutive days. Both groups had damage to the body walls of the worms, especially to the non-contractile part of the muscular layer. The severity of the damage was d...

Specificity of antibodies in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of human cerebral gnathostomiasis cases were examined by indirect fluorescent antibody technique against paraffin sections of Gnathostoma spinigerum larva. Specific greenish fluorescence was observed at cuticle, esophagus, muscle cells, intestinal cell cytoplasm and microvilli. CSF of confirmed cerebral cysticercosis cases gave fluorescence...

A live intraocular nematode was identified from a 37 year-old man presented with iritis, pain, redness, lacrimation, swelling, vision loss and intermittent blindness during many hours per day of the left eye. By using slit lamp examination, a worm was removed from iris in an ophthalmology outpatient department setting and sent to the Medical Microbiology Laboratory, Institut Pasteur du Cambodge...