Serodiagnosis of parasitic infections at a tertiary care centre in Saudi Arabia

The application of control measures, particularly population based chemotherapy has in many countries greatly reduced the incidence of serious parasitic disease manifestations. Therefore, a restrospective study was carried out to determine the prevalence of parasitic infections, as detected by serological markers at a referral center in Riyadh. A total of 1179 were tested for the following parasitic diseases; 172 for E. histolytica, 219 for echinococcus, 81 for leishmania, 624 for schistosoma and 83 patients for malaria. The prevalence rate for these infections were found to be 24.7% for echinococcus,.2.3% for E. histolytica, 4.9% for leishmania, 38.9% for schistosoma, and 30% for malaria