Serum specimens from patients with imported dengue fever and dengue hemorrhagic fever were directly subjected to reverse transcription and polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) without any RNA purification. The amplified virus genome was detected within 3 hours. The results of PCR corresponded closely to the results of virus isolation using cultured mosquito cells, suggesting that direct RT-PCR procedure greatly facilitates rapid diagnosis of dengue infection.
Admitted medical records, from January 1988 to December 1995, of 28 symptomatic amebic patients who lived in the east-southeast area of Tokyo were studied retrospectively, in order to find the present characteristics of symptomatic amebiasis due to Entamoeba histolytica in this area. Categorized by disease, there were 14 cases of colitis, 9 cases of liver abscess, 4 cases of colitis with liver abscess, and 1 case of liver abscess with brain abscess. Patients consisted of 26 Japanese males, 0 Japanese females, 1 non-Japanese male and 1 non-Japanese female. The mean age of colitis patients and liver abscess patients was 55.4 years old and 41.3 years old, respectively. The presumed place of contraction was Japan in 64% of the patients. Forty-eight percent of male patients indicated that they engaged in homosexual or bisexual practices, and 36% of male patients who denied such sexual practices or did not answer the question had no history of marriage. Positive rate of serum titre for Treponema pallidum hemagglutination test (TPHA) and human immunodeficiency virus antibody was 42.9% and 0%, respectively. Sixty-seven percent of TPHA-positive patients indicated that they engaged in male homosexual or bisexual practices. Zymodeme patterns of E. histolytica isolated from 4 colitis patients were XIV in 1 case and II in 3 cases. Symptomatic amebiasis in the east-southeast area of Tokyo is a disease which predominantly afflicts males, especially those in their middle age, and most patients contract the disease in Japan. The high rates of patients who engaged in male homosexual or bisexual practices and the high rates of patients with positive TPHA suggest that amebiasis is likely to be sexually transmitted disease in homosexual and bisexual men in the east-southeast area of Tokyo, and zymodeme II may be the predominant type in symptomatic amebic colitis in this area.
A 30-year-old Japanese homosexual AIDS patient was admitted to hospital because ofKaposi's sarcoma and mild diarrhea on February 4, 1993. Mud-like stool with blood and mucous was recognized after admission. Although serologic tests for Entamoebahistolytica were negative, trophozoites of E. histolytica were identified in his bloody stool. Daily doses of 1,000 mg of metronidazole were given orally for 6 days and then 750 mg for 4 days, and good results were observed. His CD4 count was 19.5/mm3. Symptomatic amebic colitis was easily treated and good results were obtained even with the extremely diminished CD4count. This is the first published report of symptomatic amebic colitis in an AIDSpatient in Japan.
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