Detection of toxoplasmosis and salmonellosis in meat juice: experimental and surveillance studies

Public health and economic impact of toxoplasmosis and salmonellosis in meat is considerable in terms of morbidity and even mortality in humans. Up to date, there is no suitable method for diagnosis of both diseases in meat of slaughtered animals. The present study evaluated the meat juice as a sample from experimentally infected mice with Toxoplasma gondii [T.gondii] or Salmonella typhimurium [S.typhimurium] for detection of anti-toxoplosma or anti-salmonella antibodies by an indirect enzyme linked immunosorbent assay [ELISA] technique. The results of the current study revealed that there were no statistically significant differences when comparing results of muscle juice ELISA to those obtained from serum samples of mice with strong correlation between the two samples. This indicated that, meat juice is as efficient as blood in diagnosis of toxoplasmosis and salmonellosis. Moreover, the superiority of meat juice lies in its ability for diagnosis when blood is not obtainable. The use of this sample was applied in surveillance study which was done on randomly collected beef and chicken meat. The antibodies against T.gondii and S. typhimurium were detected in 31%, 22% and 14%, 7% respectively. This justifies the importance of meat juice to be used in the future large scale meat screening programs

Management of senile cataract in diabetic patients

The association between cataract and diabetes has been the subject of much controversy. The treatment of cataract in diabetics is essentially surgical as in non-diabetics. Prior to the operation a good control of the metabolic state is required to lessen the complications. This can be achieved either by oral hypoglycasmics or insulin. No statistical differences were found in operative and post-operative complications among diabetics and non-diabetics except vitreous haemorrhage which occurred solely in the former group. I.C.C.E. operation was found to have a detrimental effect on the retinopathy, this progressed post-operatively in an aggressive manner. The net visual outcome was worse among diabetics with retinopathy especially the proloferative type. Insulin-dependent diabetics were found to have the worse prognosis regarding vision, evolution of retinopathy and complications