Mechanical transport and transmission of Cryptosporidium parvum oocysts by wild filth flies

Over the course of six months wild filth flies were collected from traps left for 7-10 days in a barn with or without a calf shedding Cryptosporidium parvum Genotype 2 oocysts in diarrheic feces. The oocysts of C. parvum transported on the flies' exoskeletons and eluted from their droplets left on visited surfaces were infectious for mice. The mean number of oocysts carried by a fly varied from 4 to 131, and the total oocyst number per collection varied from 56 to approximately 4.56 x 10(3). Fly abundance and intensity of mechanical transmission of infectious C. parvum oocysts were positively correlated, and both increased significantly when an infected calf was in the barn. Molecular data showed that the oocysts shed by infected calves were carried by flies for at least 3 weeks. Filth flies can acquire infectious C. parvum oocysts from unsanitary sites, deposit them on visited surfaces, and therefore may be involved in human or animal cryptosporidiosis.     

Perinatal outcomes from the use of antiepileptic drugs during pregnancy: a case-control study

Objective: To evaluate the perinatal results from epileptic women using antiepileptic drugs during prenatal care.

Methods: This was a retrospective longitudinal study assessing the perinatal results of women exposed to antiepileptic drugs during pregnancy, and we compared these results with those of pregnant women who were not exposed. The development of pregnancy, gestational age at delivery, Apgar scores, biometric data, morbidity, stillbirths and neonatal mortality were analyzed. The chi-square test and Fisher’s exact test were used for the categorical variables, while Student’s t-test was used for independent numerical variables.

Results: Over a 10-year period, 12?790 singleton gestations were analyzed, among which 104 (0.8%) consisted of epileptic pregnant women. From this total, 82 evolved to childbirth and their neonatal data were compared with those of 316 newborns from non-epileptic women. The most-used antiepileptic drug was phenobarbital in 70% of the cases. There was greater neonatal mortality (p?=?0.006), occurrence of neonatal hemorrhagic disorders (p?=?0.005), and occurrence of minor congenital anomalies (p?=?0.03) among the children of women exposed to antiepileptic drugs.

Conclusion: The antenatal exposure to antiepileptic drugs is associated mainly with occurrences of hemorrhagic complications during the neonatal period; furthermore, great prevalence of newborns presenting minor congenital anomalies and elevated risk of neonatal mortality.     

The utility of ultrasound in late pregnancy compared with clinical evaluation in detecting small and large for gestational age fetuses in low-risk pregnancies

Objective: To determine the utility of ultrasound (US) in late pregnancy for identifying fetuses with growth disturbances.

Methods: This study was designed as a retrospective study of birth weights over a 12-month period at the Royal Hobart Hospital (RHH) and Barwon Health (BH). Data were collected from the discharge summaries and medical records at both hospitals targeting abnormal fetal weight below 10th percentile (small for gestational age – SGA) and above 90th percentile (large for gestational age – LGA).

Results: There were 4079 study patients from both hospitals. After weight adjustment by gender and gestational age, an abnormal fetal weight was detected in 741 cases (babies over the 90th percentile or below 10th percentile). One hundred and twenty-eight patients with high-risk pregnancies were excluded. Therefore, a total of 613 patients remained that were considered to be low-risk pregnancies with abnormal foetal growth; 305 patients from RHH and 308 from BH. The antenatal detection rate for LGA was 35.9%, at RHH by combination of US and clinical evaluation, while for BH it was 34.8% by clinical evaluation alone (p?=?0.910). The antenatal detection rate for SGA was 36.8% via US and clinical evaluation at RHH and 54.5% by clinical evaluation alone at BH (p?=?0.006).

Conclusion: This study shows no benefit in the use of routine US for the antenatal diagnosis of LGA compared with clinical evaluation in low-risk pregnancies. US evaluation was inferior to clinical evaluation in the antenatal diagnosis of SGA in low-risk pregnancies.     

Purified membrane and soluble folate binding proteins from cultured KB cells have similar amino acid compositions and molecular weights but differ in fatty acid acylation.

A membrane-associated folate binding protein (FBP) and a soluble FBP, which is released into the culture medium, have been purified from human KB cells using affinity chromatography. By NaDodSO4/PAGE, both proteins have an apparent Mr of approximately 42,000. However, in the presence of Triton X-100, the soluble FBP eluted from a Sephadex G-150 column with an apparent Mr of approximately 40,000 (similar to NaDodSO4/PAGE) but the membrane-associated FBP eluted with an apparent Mr of approximately 160,000, indicating that this species contains a hydrophobic domain that interacts with the detergent micelles. The amino acid compositions of both forms of FBP were similar, especially with respect to the apolar amino acids. In addition, the 18 amino acids at the amino termini of both proteins were identical. The membrane FBP, following delipidation with chloroform/methanol, contained 7.1 mol of fatty acid per mol of protein, of which 4.7 mol was amide-linked and 2.4 mol was ester-linked. The soluble FBP contained only 0.05 mol of fatty acid per mol of protein. These studies indicate that the membrane FBP of KB cells contains covalently bound fatty acids that may serve to anchor the protein in the cell membrane.     

Asymptomatic human carriers of Leishmania chagasi

In Brazil, programs based on elimination of infected dogs have not curtailed the spread of visceral leishmaniasis (VL), suggesting that other reservoirs of infection exist. Persons with active VL can infect the sand fly vector, but in endemic areas, persons with asymptomatic infections, whose infectivity to sand flies is unknown, are far more numerous. In this study, a polymerase chain reaction-based assay detected kinetoplast DNA of Leishmania chagasi in the blood of eight of 108 asymptomatic persons living with patients with recently diagnosed VL. These eight persons had low or unmeasurable levels of IgG antibodies to Leishmania, demonstrating the insensitivity of serology for subclinical infection. All eight persons had positive leishmanin skin test results, as did 70% of persons living in households of persons with active VL. Even if a small proportion of such asymptomatic persons are infective to sand flies, they represent a formidable reservoir of infection in endemic areas.