Intestinal Parasitic Infections Among Patients Who Visited Woldia Comprehensive Specialized Hospital’s Emergency Department Over a Six-Year Period, Woldia, Ethiopia: A Retrospective Study

Abstract

Background

Despite ongoing intensive public health intervention efforts, intestinal parasitic infections (IPIs) remain a major public health problem in developing countries, including Ethiopia. Having updated epidemiological data focusing on the top common IPIs that cause emergency visits is crucial for implementing area-specific and evidence-based intervention strategies. Hence, this study aimed to determine the prevalence of IPIs in Woldia Comprehensive Specialized Hospital’s (WCSH) emergency laboratory over a six-year period.

Methods

An institutional-based retrospective study was conducted to assess the prevalence of IPIs over a six-year period (2014–2019) using a recorded saline wet-mount stool sample examination result in the laboratory logbook at WCSH’s emergency department.

Results

In this study, of the total of 11,281 clinically suspected individuals who were requested for stool sample examination, 3908 (34.6%) individuals were diagnosed with IPs. The majority of confirmed cases were caused by protozoan parasites (32.9%), followed by helminth infections (1.7%). A slight fluctuating trend in the prevalence of IPs was observed in the six-year study period, with the highest prevalence documented in the year of 2014 (41.3%) and the lowest in 2017 (28.0%). Entamoeba histolytica/dispar and Giardia lamblia accounts for 95% of the IPs. The prevalence of protozoan infection was significantly higher in females (p-value = 0.0101), while H. nana (p-value =0.0138) and E. vermicularis (p-value = 0.0201) infections were higher in males. The highest and the lowest IP prevalence were reported in the age groups of 45–54 years (40%) and under five years (25.6%), respectively.

Conclusion and Recommendations

In the study area, nearly one-third of patients with emergency visits due to gastrointestinal symptoms were infected with IPs. This underlines the severity of the problem in the study area, which requires a collaborative effort of concerned bodies to minimize the burden of IP to the level where it is no longer a public health threat.

Keywords:

• intestinal parasite infection
• protozoa
• helminth
• emergency
• Ethiopia

Abbreviations

IP, intestinal parasite; IPI, intestinal parasite infection; NTD, neglected tropical diseases; WCSH, Woldia Comprehensive Specialized Hospital; WHO, World Health Organization.

Data Sharing Statement

All data generated or analyzed during this study were included in this article. Data that support the findings of this study are also available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Ethical Approval and Consent to Participate

Before the commencement of the study, we obtained ethical clearance from Institutional Review Board of Woldia University, and an official letter of cooperations was provided to WCSH. Before data collection, we explained the study objectives to the heads of the hospital and laboratory unit. Since we used secondary data for this study, we didn’t require the patient’s informed consent. We conducted the study following the Declaration of Helsinki.⁴⁴ To maintain the confidentiality of information from participant’s record, we didn’t record any personal identifiers on the data collection sheet rather we used specific identification code for each recorded participant data, and secured data from participant records were not available to anyone except for the investigators.

Acknowledgments

We thank all the Medical Laboratory staff working at the emergency laboratory of WCSH for their support during the data collection period.

Author Contributions

All authors made a significant contribution to the work reported, whether that is in the conception, study design, execution, acquisition of data, analysis and interpretation, or in all these areas; took part in drafting, revising or critically reviewing the article; gave final approval of the version to be published; have agreed on the journal to which the article has been submitted; and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work.

Disclosure

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest in relation to this work.

Additional information

Funding

There is no funding to report.