Seroprevalence of selected viral, bacterial and parasitic infections among inpatients of a public psychiatric hospital of Mexico Soroprevalência de infecções virais bacterianas e parasíticas nos pacientes internados em hospital público psiquiátrico do México

• Main Authors: Cosme Alvarado-Esquivel, Miguel Ángel Arreola-Valenzuela, Alfredo Rodríguez-Briones, Olga Patricia Alanís-Quiñones, Sergio Estrada-Martínez, Carlos Luevanos-Becerra, Luis Felipe Martínez-Saenz, Sergio Arturo Martínez-García, Eda Guadalupe Ramírez-Valles, Isaac Ibarra-Torres, Cesar Arnulfo González-Verdín
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Universidade de São Paulo (USP) 2008
• Subjects: Psychiatric patients; Infections; Prevalence; Virus; Parasite; Bacteria; Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine; RC955-962; Infectious and parasitic diseases; RC109-216; Arctic
• Online Access: https://doaj.org/article/cde102d3515b41e586bd5dd4c39af23e

We sought to determine the frequency of serological markers of selected infections in a population of psychiatric patients in Durango City, Mexico, and to determine whether there are any epidemiological characteristics of the subjects associated with the infections. One hundred and five inpatients of a public psychiatric hospital of Durango were examined for HBsAg, anti-HCV antibodies, anti-HIV antibodies, anti-Brucella antibodies, rapid plasma reagin and anti-Cysticercus antibodies by commercially available assays. Anti-Cysticercus antibodies were confirmed by Western blot and HBsAg by neutralization assay. Epidemiological data from each participant were also obtained. Seroprevalences of HBsAg, anti-HCV, anti-HIV, anti-Brucella, rapid plasma reagin and anti-Cysticercus antibodies found were 0.0%, 4.8%, 0.9%, 0.0%, 1.9%, and 0.9%, respectively. Overall, 9 (8.6%) inpatients showed seropositivity to any infection marker. We concluded that our psychiatric inpatients have serological evidence of a number of infections. HCV is an important pathogen among our psychiatric inpatients. Health care strategies for prevention and control of infections in Mexican psychiatric patients should be considered. Procuramos determinar a frequência de marcadores sorológicos de infecções em pacientes psiquiátricos da cidade de Durango, México e determinar se existem características epidemiológicas dos pacientes que podem ser associados a estas infecções. Cento e cinco pacientes internados neste hospital psiquiátrico de Durango foram examinados para HBsAg, anticorpos anti-HCV, anticorpos anti-HIV, anticorpos anti-Brucella, reaginas plasmáticos imediatas e anticorpos anti-Cysticercus por testes comerciais. Os anticorpos anti-Cysticercus foram confirmadoss por Western Blot e o HbsAg por testes de neutralização. Dados epidemiológicos de cada participante foram também obtidos. Soroprevalências encontradas de HbsAg, anti-HCV, anti-HIV, anti-Brucella, reagina plasmática imediata e anticorpos anti-Cysticercus foram respectivamente 0,0%, 4,8%, ...