Clinico-epidemiological profile of malaria cases admitted in a tertiary care hospital, in South India

ABSTRACT

Background: Malaria is a global health problem leading to huge morbidity and mortality. India accounts for 4% of global malaria cases and 52% of malaria deaths outside the African region. A disease that was relatively unknown in Mangaluru till 1990, has shown consistent rise till 2015 killing nearly 300 people. Though, declining trends are being observed since 2015, yet its incidence continues to be high. Present study was undertaken to study clinical as well as epidemiological factors associated with malaria transmission in Mangaluru.Methods: A record based retrospective study was conducted in A J Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre Mangaluru tertiary care hospital. The data was retrieved from the Medical Record Department of the hospital for three years i.e. 2015 to 2017 and analysed.Results: A total of 1779 confirmed cases of malaria were admitted during the study period. Out of these 1309 (73.58%) cases were due P. vivax, 73 (04.10%) cases due to P. falciparum 306 (17.20%) cases had mixed infections while species of remaining 91 (05.11%) cases remained unspecified. A peak in the number of inpatients was seen in June while mean duration of hospital stay was 5.17±3.31 days. A total of 252 (14.16%) patients had one or more severe manifestations of malaria as per WHO guidelines.Conclusions: The present study reveals that majority of admitted malaria cases were young adult males belonged to urban area. Majority of the cases were infected by Plasmodium vivax or had mixed infections.