Search

Dengue is an emerging mosquito borne disease of public health importance in Nepal. A descriptive cross sectional study was carried out to estimate sero-prevalence and distribution pattern of dengue in certain vulnerable regions of Nepal from June to September 2009. A total of 460 venous blood samples were collected from individuals experiencing a febrile illness clinically consistent with dengue infection visiting nearby hospitals of Kanchanpur, Kailali, Banke, Dang and Chitwan districts. The sero-prevalence of dengue virus specific IgM was determined by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kit. The anti-dengue IgM positivity was found to be 12.17%. The higher frequency of positive cases (16.4%) were from age group 20-40 years followed by < 20 years age group with 9.7% and 5.3% from > 40 years age group. The association between dengue infection and age is found to be statistically significant (p < 0.05). The male:female ratio was determined as 1.3:1 in IgM positive population. Among sampling areas, Kanchanpur showed highest prevalence of dengue infection (15.5%) followed by Chitwan (11.7%), Kailai (11.1%), Banke (10.7%) and Dang (8.3%). Similarly, 94.6% of the positive cases were indigeneous and had no history of travel to other countries. Dengue is firmly established in terai region with increasing trends of infection and expansion into newer areas raising a public health threat. Regular epidemiological studies are suggested which could further reveal the contributing factors associated with dengue virus infection and help in formulating strategies in reducing the transmission rate and control of the infection.

Two new rotavirus vaccines were recently introduced to the market and have shown a tremendous impact in reducing severe diarrhea due to rotavirus in children. Diarrheal disease is a common cause of morbidity and mortality among Nepalese children. In anticipation of a rotavirus vaccine in Nepal, we systematically reviewed published articles on rotavirus infection in Nepal. Literatures were searched in health related national and international databases. Fifteen rotavirus related articles between 1978 and 2010 were identified. Of these, information from five articles were extracted and analyzed in the present study. Of 3671 participants, 864 were positive for rotavirus infection by ELISA. The prevalence ofrotavirus infection ranged from 12 to 39%. G1P[8] (25%) was the most frequent combined G and P genotype, followed by G12P[6] (23%) and G2P[4] (16%) between 2003 and 2007. Nearly 9% of analyzed rotavirus positive samples (G and P genotype) were non-typable. The data demonstrated that rotavirus is the most identifiable cause of severe diarrhea in children less than 5 years old in Nepal. The wide variety of rotavirus strains circulating in Nepal; underscore the need for continued surveillance. This will be the key to understanding the epidemiological characteristics of rotavirus disease and the impact of vaccination after introduction.

The high prevalence of anemia and underweight among reproductive age women is a serious health concern in Nepal. The objective of the present study was to describe anemia prevalence and nutritional status of married women in Nepal. Total of 278 women were included in the present analysis. The five communities included an urban commercial area (W) in Kathmandu, an agricultural village (K) in Lalitpur District, an agricultural village in Chitwan District (C) and one in Ilam District (I) with intensive cash cropping, and another rural village in Kaski District (P) with high number of international out-migration of males. The study procedure included anthropometric measurements, blood collection for hemoglobin measurement, and stool collection for examination of hookworm infection, and a structured interview on their reproductive history including contraceptive use. The altitude adjusted prevalence of anemia was 65%, 23%, 16%, 49% and 58% in communities C, I, K, P and W respectively. The hookworm prevalence of each community was not associated with the anemia prevalence. In the urban well-off community W, although 38% of the women had BMI > or = 25 and only 2% of women had BMI<18.5, 58% of the women were anemic. A logistic regression analysis on the anemia risk at the individual level showed no effect of helminth infection, but a significant negative effect of Depo-Provera (depot-medroxyprogesterone acetate) use. Causes of high anemia prevalence among the women resided in the urban well-off area should be investigated in future studies.

A cross-sectional study was conducted to determine dengue virus IgM-positive rate in Terai region, Nepal from August to December 2007. Serum samples were collected from 183 symptomatic cases. The samples were examined for dengue virus specific IgM using particle agglutination test. Of 183 serum samples, 55 (30.0%) had positive for dengue IgM antibody. The positive rate was highest (50.0%) in Biratnagar, and lowest (19.6%) in Chitwan male to female ratio was 2:1 in IgM-positive populations. IgM-positive rate was 29.0% at ages 21-30, 25.4% at ages 11-20 and 23.6% at ages 0-10, but 10.9% at ages 31-40, and ages over 40. There was not significant association between occupation of the patients and positive rate among farmer, labour, service, business and student.

Visceral Leishmaniasis (VL) is a serious disease caused by Leishmania donovani (LD) complex and prevalent in the temperate and tropical zones of the earth. VL, endemic in the southern plains of the 14 districts in the Terai region of Nepal, is considered a major public health problem. Cutanous leishmaniasis (CL) is prevalent mainly in the tropics and subtropics, affects nearly 1.5 million people worldwide. No reported cases of CL have been identified in Nepal until now. We report the first case of CL in a Nepalese patient.

Dengue virus transmitted by Aedes mosquito is one of the important cause health problems in world. Dengue fever and more severe and often fatal forms namely dengue hemorrhagic fever and dengue shock syndrome are emerging health problems in many part of the globe. No cases of Dengue virus infection have been reported from Nepal till date and for the first time, we report a case of dengue fever from Nepal.