Parasitic diseases

Background

• Although any organism that "lives in or on another and takes its nourishment from that other organism" is technically a parasite, in common medical parlance "parasitic diseases" refer to infections due to protozoa, helminths, arthropods, or other "macroparasites"

List

• Chagas Disease
• Lice
• Onchocerciasis (River Blindness)
• Myiasis
• Cysticercosis
• Loa Loa

African Sleeping Sickness

• Tsetse fly
• Winterbottom's sign: posterior cervical LAD (Gambiense)

Swimmer's Itch

• Cercaria (non-human schistisomes)
• Exposed areas

Enterobius vermicularis

• Nocturnal perianal itch (pinworm)

Larva Currens

• Thumbprint sign: periumbilical purpura
• Strongyloides stercoralis

Dracunculosis

• Copepods (Cyclops spp)
• Metro and excision

Trichinosis

• Trichinella spiralis
• Splinter hemorrhages
• Pork, polar bear, walrus

M. Opercularis

• Wolly caterpillar
• Train-track hemorrages
• 'Erucism' inflammation around hairs, can be chronic, can cause systemic effects

Cimex lenticularis

• Bedbugs
• Hep B carrier's

See Also

• Microbiology (Main)
• Travel Medicine