The paddy field dermatitis in Saitama Prefecture / 日本農村医学会雑誌

ABSTRACT

A dermatitis of unknown etiology has occurred among farmers working in Chichibu City, in north-west of Saitama Prefecture from 1970 to 1972.<BR>The dermatitis exhibited clinical, manifestations quite similar to a already known bird schistosome.dermatitis being characterized by erythemato-papulo-vesicular eruptions accompanied with severe itching on the parts exposed to the water, especially legs and arms.<BR>Survey on the snail intermediate hosts were undertaken in the paddy fields and a species of furcocercous cercaria was found from <I>Polypylis</I> hemisphaerula.The incidence of the snails infected with the cercariae was 3.2%.The cercaria resembled to that of <I>Gigantobilharzia struniae</I> in size and shape.<BR>The cercaria invaded into the human skin within 30 minutes after being put on a part of the surface of skin and caused a pinpoint-sized red maculae and tingling itching.<BR>From these results, the paddy field dermatitis occurring in Chichibu City was proved to be caused by the invasion of the cercaria into the human skin, which differed from that served as causative organism of the dermatitis occurring in the eastern area of Saitama Prefecture.