You are here

  • Home
  • Archive
  • Volume 8, Issue Suppl 10
  • PA-379 Effect of soil-transmitted helminth infections on haemoglobin level in plasmodium infection among children and young adults living in rural areas of Gabon, Central Africa

Article Text

Article menu

Download PDFPDF

Abstracts of Poster and e-Poster Presentations
PA-379 Effect of soil-transmitted helminth infections on haemoglobin level in plasmodium infection among children and young adults living in rural areas of Gabon, Central Africa
Free
  1. Jean Claude Dejon Agobé1,
  2. Jean Ronald Edoa1,
  3. Jeannot Fréjus Zinsou1,
  4. Yabo Josiane Honkpéhèdji1,
  5. Christian Chassem Lapue1,
  6. Roméo Adegbitè1,
  7. Stravensky Térence Boussougou-Sambe1,
  8. Tamirat Gebru Woldearegai2,
  9. Benjamin Mordmüller3,
  10. Ayôla Akim Adegnika1
  1. 1Centre de Recherches Médicales de Lambaréné, Gabon
  2. 2Institut für Tropenmedizin, Universitätsklinikum Tübingen, Germany
  3. 3Department of Medical Microbiology, Radboud University Medical Center, The Netherlands

Abstract

Background Plasmodium infection remains a public health issue in endemic areas, with anaemia being one of the main indicators of disease morbidity. In areas co-endemic for helminths, both infections very often occur in the same individual and interactions have been reported. The present analysis aimed to assess the effect of helminth infections on haemoglobin concentration in Plasmodium infection in a population of children and young adults living in rural areas of Gabon.

Methods The study was longitudinal where participants were followed for six months. Urogenital schistosomiasis (UGS), soil-transmitted helminths (STH), and filariasis were assessed by microscopy at baseline and at month six. Plasmodium infection status and haemoglobin concentration were assessed at month six, only. Anaemia was defined using the recommendation of the WHO.

Results A total of 217 participants were included in this analysis. Of them, 73% (160, 95%CI: 67–79) were anaemic. Anaemia was associated with Plasmodium infection (p-value=0.04), but not with UGS (p-value=0.12), STH infection (p-value=0.16), and filariasis (p-value=0.59). Adjusted to age, sex, ascariasis, and UGS, participants with Plasmodium infection had an odds of 2.44 (95%CI: 1.07–6.13) of anaemia, compared to those without Plasmodium infection. In the stratified analysis on STH and adjusted to age and sex, participants with Plasmodium infection had a significant decrease in haemoglobin concentration as compared to those without (β= -0.90, 95%CI: -1.36 – -0.43, p-value<0.001) among participants infected with STH, while no difference was observed between both groups among participants negative for STH (p-value=0.051).

Conclusion Our results reveal a high prevalence of anaemia making it a serious public health issue in our community. We found Plasmodium infection as the main parasitic infection associated with anaemia in our community, with STH infections showing a protective effect on the reduction of haemoglobin concentration in Plasmodium infection.

Funding source: Deutsche Forschungsge-meinschaft (DFG), grant number: MO 1071/12–1.

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2023-EDC.177

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.