A re-assessment of the epidemiology and clinico-pathological features of human trypanosomiasis in Rhodesia
Ashworth, T.G.; Goldsmid, J.
Central African Journal of Medicine 21(12 Suppl): 1-12
1975
ISSN/ISBN: 0008-9176 PMID: 1212687 Document Number: 93169
Surveys carried out in 1969 in the Rhodesian endemic sleeping sickness area in the Zambezi valley between Lake Kariba and the Hunyani river revealed malaria parasites in 20% of 1157 and filarial parasites in 4.5%, but no trypanosomes were found. Of 579 plasma samples, 12% had IgM levels greater than 800 IU/ml, the value of the positive control from a known case of sleeping sickness. 24 subjects with high IgM levels were examined 4 months later and were found (apart from high blood sedimentation rates) to show no evidence of disease; inoculated rats did not develop parasitaemia. The clinico-pathological features of 32 sleeping sickness patients (18 African, 14 European) from Zambia and Rhodesia are described. In the European patients acute febrile disease occurred accompanied by a rash; there was generally a favourable response to suramin. The African patients had neither chancre nor rash; 15 showed meningeal involvement without a clear cut history of febrile disease. These patients required treatment with melarsoprol.