Serological study of toxocariasis in patients with hypereosinophilia

Toxocariasis is an infection of human due to larvae of Toxocara canis, or Toxocara cati. This is a prospective study which undertaken between February 2013 to January 2014 at parasitology and immunology laboratories of Imam reza hospital of Mashhad. A total of 40 patients with hypereosinophilia without allergic symptoms selected as case group and 40 patients without hypereosinophilia as control group. Blood sera samples of both groups were examined for IgG antibodies against toxocara by ELISA method. The seroprevalences of Toxocara antibodies in the case group and control group were 9 (22.5%) and 1 (2.5%) respectively. Mean age of case group was 41.8±12.7 and control group 47.3 ±13.9, 47.5% of case group were females and 52.5% were males. Seroepidemiological studies of toxocariasis carried out in Iran revealed seroprevalence rates of 2% to 25.6% among the normal human population. Since human toxocariasis is the infection by larval stage of the worms and only diagnosed by serological methods, therefore the individuals with unknown hyper eosinophilia have indication for detection of Anti toxocara in their serum samples. This study revealed that the infection could be found in Mashhad.