Search

Tuberculosis (TB) is endemic in many developing countries including Pakistan. It is a leading cause of death from a single infectious agent worldwide. Identification and early treatment of latent conditions help reduce the complications associated with TB. However, the identification of individuals with latent infection is a time taking and expensive process. According to previous studies, a promising and cheap biomarker of TB may be the monocyte-to-lymphocyte ratio (MLR). It may indicate a body’s immune response to Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Since household contacts of tuberculosis (TB) patients have an increased risk of latent tuberculosis (LTBI), using the established diagnostic procedures as well as checking their MLR might help determine if they contracted LTBI or not. We conducted acrosssectional study to determine if MLR could be used to identify LTBI among household contacts of patients with active tuberculosis. Out of the 100 subjects selected for this study, about 40 patients were recently diagnosed with active tuberculosis, 40 were close contacts of these patients, while20 were chosen to be controls. The mean was 0.165, 0.06 (range 0.03–0.08), and 0.04 (0.02–0.04) inpatients with active tuberculosis, close contacts of patients, and control subjects, respectively. Hence, it was determined that MLR (> 0.6 %)is a significant predictor for LTBI 2 can be used to diagnose it in close contacts of TB patients. It was additionally observed that patients over the age of 50 with pulmonary tuberculosis have higher MLR.

Certain Rh positive blood groups showed a link between the ABO blood grouping and susceptibility to some infectious ailments. Study was carried out to find the association of ABO Blood Group System / Rh type with different viral infection. A retrospective observational study was carried in 7631 blood donors to find the association of ABO Blood Group System / Rh type with viral infection due to hepatitis B virus, hepatitis C virus, human immunodeficiency virus and Syphilis. Data of the study indicateF that the highest incidence of blood group in blood donor was B followed by O, A and AB. The incidence of HBsAg +ve, HCV Ab +ve and infection of Syphilis was also highest in donor with blood group B followed by O, A and AB. Blood group A were more susceptible to HIV Ab +ve followed by blood group B, O and AB. The group B donors had the greatest risk of viral infection with HBV, HCV, HIV, and Syphilis; followed by the groups O, A, and AB. Donors in group AB had the lowest incidence rate of all viral infection. The study revealed that blood group B is most prevalent among donors, followed by blood groups O, A, and AB. On the other side, the rate of HBV, HCV, HIV, and Syphilis infection was greatest among group B donors, followed by group O, group A, and group AB. Keywords: ABO Blood Group System, hepatitis B virus (HBV), hepatitis C virus (HCV), human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), syphilis Copyright(c) The Authors