Prevalence and Intensity of Urinary Schistosomiasis Among School Children in the District of Niakhar, Region of Fatick, Senegal
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Prevalence and intensity of urinary schistosomiasis among school children in the district of Niakhar, region of Fatick, Senegal. Bruno Senghor, Aldiouma Diallo, Seydou Sylla, Souleymane Doucouré, Mamadou Ndiath, Lobna Gaayeb, Félicité Djuikwo-Teukeng, Cheikh Bâ, Cheikh Sokhna To cite this version: Bruno Senghor, Aldiouma Diallo, Seydou Sylla, Souleymane Doucouré, Mamadou Ndiath, et al.. Prevalence and intensity of urinary schistosomiasis among school children in the district of Niakhar, region of Fatick, Senegal.. Parasites and Vectors, BioMed Central, 2014, 7 (1), pp.5. 10.1186/1756- 3305-7-5. inserm-00924502 HAL Id: inserm-00924502 https://www.hal.inserm.fr/inserm-00924502 Submitted on 6 Jan 2014 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Senghor et al. Parasites & Vectors 2014, 7:5 http://www.parasitesandvectors.com/content/7/1/5 RESEARCH Open Access Prevalence and intensity of urinary schistosomiasis among school children in the district of Niakhar, region of Fatick, Senegal Bruno Senghor1,2, Aldiouma Diallo1, Seydou N Sylla1,3, Souleymane Doucouré1, Mamadou O Ndiath1, Lobna Gaayeb4, Félicité F Djuikwo-Teukeng5, Cheikh T Bâ2 and Cheikh Sokhna1* Abstract Background: Urinary schistosomiasis is a parasitic disease that exists in all regions of Senegal. It is a major public health issue in this country. This study was carried out to determine the prevalence and intensity of this parasitosis in 12 villages of Niakhar (Fatick, Senegal). Methods: A total of 210 schoolchildren, aged 7 to 15 years, were enrolled in this study, and urine samples were examined for Schistosoma haematobium eggs using a standard urine filtration technique. Results: Of these children, 121 (57.6%) were found to be infected with a mean geometric count of 185 eggs per 10 ml of urine. The disease was present in all surveyed villages, and the prevalence ranged from 14.3% to 92.8%. The prevalence of infection was significantly correlated with increasing age and was higher in boys. Infection intensity was significantly higher in boys but did not significantly differ with age. Significant relationships between i) water contact or access to running water and ii) the prevalence or intensity of urinary schistosomiasis were also noted. Conclusions: The district of Niakhar is endemic for urinary schistosomiasis, with a high intensity of infection. A control program to decrease the prevalence and intensity should be implemented in this area to improve community health. Keywords: Epidemiology, Helminths, Infection, Intensity, Niakhar, Prevalence, Senegal, Urinary schistosomiasis Background with urinary and intestinal schistosomiasis, respectively, Schistosomiasis is a chronic and debilitating disease and the number of persons at risk of infection is greater caused by digenetic trematode flatworms (flukes) of the than 600 million [5]. Therapeutic vaccines represent an al- genus Schistosoma. This water-dependent disease is en- ternative to chemotherapy (praziquantel) to control this demic in rural areas where there is a lack of drinking disease [6]. However, the lack of epidemiological data on water [1]. Schistosomiasis is one of the most common parasite prevalence may hamper control interventions and parasitic infections in the world, ranking second after mal- the development of vaccination strategies. aria in terms of socio-economic and public health import- In Senegal, urinary schistosomiasis has been wide- ance, especially in rural areas of developing countries spread and poses a public health problem, particularly in [2,3]. Of the 239 million people with active Schistosoma children [7,8]. It is present in all regions of the country infections in 2009 [4], 85% lived in sub-Saharan Africa, where [9], with a mean estimated prevalence of 25% in 2003 approximately 112 million and 54 million were infected [10]. In the Niakhar district, one previous study on the protective effect of schistosomiasis against malaria was carried out in two villages (Tukar and Diokhine), and the overall prevalence of urinary schistosomiasis was 67% * Correspondence: [email protected] 1Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, UMR 198 (URMITE), Campus [10]. As no mass treatment against this helminthiasis has International de Hann, IRD, BP 1386, CP 18524 Dakar, Senegal been carried out in this area, the aim of the present study Full list of author information is available at the end of the article © 2014 Senghor et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Senghor et al. Parasites & Vectors 2014, 7:5 Page 2 of 6 http://www.parasitesandvectors.com/content/7/1/5 was to determine the prevalence and intensity of urinary February to June 2009, and it involved children aged 7 to schistosomiasis among school children. 15 years. The methodology used was cluster sampling, as recommended by the World Health Organization, with Methods samples of at least 210 subjects each, which were divided Study area into 30 clusters of at least 7 subjects. Because we had 20 The study was carried out at Niakhar (14°30′ N, 16°30′ primary schools, we decided to work on 15 clusters of 14 W), a Demographic Site Survey (DSS) located in the re- subjects each, giving us the same sample size of 210. The gion of Fatick (Sine-Saloum), 135 km east of Dakar, the sampling interval (SI) was determined by the formula SI = capital of Senegal, West Africa. The study zone (Figure 1a) M/n, with M as the total number of schoolchildren in was approximately 15 km long and 15 km wide and cov- 2009 and n as the number of clusters (SI = 6.873/15 = ered 230 km2. The climate is continental Sudan-Sahelian, 458). To determine the first cluster for investigation, a with temperatures ranging from 24°C in December- random draw of numbers was made between 1 and the January to 30°C in May-June [11]. The rainy season spans number corresponding to the sampling interval (458). The four months (July-October), and the mean annual precipi- school with the closest number of schoolchildren to the SI tation was 506 mm from 1962 to 2010 [12]. The district number was chosen first. Other schools were selected as includes 30 villages with a total of 43,000 inhabitants [13], follows: E, E + SI, E + 2 SI, E + 3 SI … (E, number of chil- mainly of the serer ethnic group (96.4%) [14]. An environ- dren in the first selected school). The 15 clusters were dis- mental survey of this area has mapped all of the water tributed over 14 villages (out of the 20 villages that had at sources (backwater, ponds, wells and supply taps), and it least a primary school). A total of 210 schoolchildren were showed that the two-thirds of the population had no ac- enrolled in the study. cess to tap water [11]. A more detailed description of the Niakhar district has been given elsewhere [15]. Sample collection and analysis Urine samples were collected between 10:00 a.m. and Selection of children 2:00 p.m., and their macroscopic aspect in transparent All the studies in the Niakhar district were conducted with urine jars was examined. All samples that did not have a the approval of the National Ethics Committee of Senegal. more or less dark yellow and a translucent aspect, with- Oral consent was obtained after meeting with parents of out any particulates, were considered abnormal. We se- schoolchildren and chiefs of the villages. A cross-sectional lected three macroscopic aspects: clear urine (urine of descriptive and analytical study was carried out from normal appearance and translucent), cloudy urine (urine Figure 1 Localization of the studied area in Senegal (A) and distribution of prevalence and intensity of infection (B). Senghor et al. Parasites & Vectors 2014, 7:5 Page 3 of 6 http://www.parasitesandvectors.com/content/7/1/5 of abnormal appearance, not translucent, with clots or Results suspension elements) and hematic urine (abnormal urine, Sample characteristics non-translucent and red). Data were collected using a The sex ratio (M/F) was 0.9, with 101 boys and 109 girls. questionnaire whose reliability has been demonstrated in The average age was 10.4 years (SD: 2.1 years). The indi- several countries for the detection of high-risk areas for viduals were divided into three age groups (7–9, 10–12 schistosomiasis [16,17]. This questionnaire was given to and 13–15 years), representing 37.2%, 41.4% and 21.4% of each urine-providing child to collect information on the the children, respectively. Hematuria (52.4%) and dysuria child’s sex, age, water contact, symptoms of urinary schis- (54.3%) were the most commonly reported symptoms by tosomiasis, knowledge about the disease, and previous both infected and uninfected children. Abdominal pain praziquantel treatment. A plastic urine jar of 50 ml was (34.7%) was the least reported symptom. Macroscopic then given to each child with a number corresponding to urine examination showed that clear urine (49%) was the questionnaire. Urine samples were transported to the more frequent than cloudy urine (40%) or hematic (11%) Niakhar laboratory for analysis. urine. A few children (4.8%) had knowledge of schisto- Microscopic examination of each urine sample for de- somiasis, and 5.5% had received previous treatments for tection of S.