Climate change and predicted trend of fungal keratitis in Egypt

Rising rates of invasive fungal infections may be linked to global climate change. A study was made of the trend of ophthalmic fungal corneal keratitis in the greater Cairo area of Egypt and its association with climate records during the same period. Data on diagnosed cases of fungal keratitis were collected from records of ophthalmic departments of Cairo University hospital and atmospheric temperature and humidity for the greater Cairo area were obtained from online records. Statistical analysis showed a significant increase in the relative frequency of keratornycosis during 1997-2007. The rise correlated significantly with rises in minimum temperature and the maximum atmospheric humidity in the greater Cairo area over the same period [after exclusion of the effect of the maximum atmospheric temperature]. The predicted increase in keratornycosis up to the year 2030 corresponds to predicted increases in CO[2] emissions and surface temperature from climate change models for Egypt

Evaluation of semi - quantitative PCR and IgG and IgM Elisa in Diagnosis of toxoplasmosis in females with miscarriage

This study was performed on 100 female [age 20-42 years] patients classified into group I, 40 patients presented with abortion in the first trimester; group II, 33 patients with abortion in the second trimester and group III, 27 patients with intrauterine fetal death [IUFD]. The positive percentages of semi-quantitative PCR and both IgG and IgM ELISA were 38% and 35%, respectively. Ten cases out of 38 were positive for toxoplasmosis by both PCR and ELISA-IgG, while 5 cases were positive by both PCR and ELISA-IgM. Sixteen cases out of 38 PCR positive cases were positive by both ELISA IgG and IgM. Sensitivity and specificity of both ELISA IgG and IgM were 81.57% and 93.54%, respectively. False negative results by ELISA were found in 7 out of 38 positive toxoplasmosis cases detected by semi-quantitative PCR. Three out of those seven cases with false negative by ELISA were detected with a trophozoite copy load of 101 trophozoite/mL in the blood sample by semi-quantitative PCR