Toxoplasma Igg Antibodies Detected - What Does It Mean And Treatment

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Toxoplasma Igg Antibodies Detected - What Does It Mean And Treatment
Toxoplasma Igg Antibodies Detected - What Does It Mean And Treatment

Video: Toxoplasma Igg Antibodies Detected - What Does It Mean And Treatment

Video: Toxoplasma Igg Antibodies Detected - What Does It Mean And Treatment
Video: Toxoplasma Infections Treatment | Lecture on Infectious Medicine for Medical Students 2024, March
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How to treat toxoplasmosis when igg antibodies are found

Content

  • 1 Reasons
  • 2 Types
  • 3 Symptoms
  • 4 What to do with toxoplasmosis
  • 5 What is IgM and IgG
  • 6 Treatment of toxoplasmosis
  • 7 Problem prevention

Toxoplasmosis is a disease that causes systemic disorders in the human or animal body, caused by the vital activity of Toxoplasma gondii. The problem is widespread, while in African countries and South America, up to 90% of cases are recorded, and in Canada, the United States and European countries, the figure is lower - 30-50% of the population is affected by the parasite.

The reasons

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Reasons for infection

Toxoplasmosis mainly affects pets, cats or dogs, which in turn infects humans. The parasite carries a particular danger during pregnancy, it is able to provoke systemic changes and cause irreparable harm to the unborn child, or even cause a miscarriage. Therefore, pregnant women are advised to avoid any contact with pets, especially cats, and to be tested for toxoplasmosis before pregnancy.

Intermediate hosts of the parasite are not dangerous to humans, since the parasite in the form of cysts in their body simply cannot exist.

Sometimes the eggs of the parasite are found in meat, if you eat it without heat treatment, the eggs penetrate the body and give rise to the development of the parasite. It is for the same reasons that pets should be given exclusively meat that has been boiled or fried.

Cases are recorded when human infection occurred directly through the blood when bitten by infected insects.

The most dangerous way of spreading the parasite is intrauterine infection. This happens when the mother is sick with toxoplasmosis or becomes infected with a parasite during pregnancy and the body does not produce antibodies. The parasite easily enters the placenta and harm the unformed baby. The presence of a positive IgM result in a study for toxoplasmosis and a negative IgG result may be the basis for termination of pregnancy.

Banal non-observance of personal hygiene rules, direct contact with the excrement of a pet, or eating meat that has not been processed by high temperatures can increase the risk of infection with a parasite.

Since a person is not the final host for the parasite, contact with a sick person is absolutely safe for other people. Toxoplasmosis is not transmitted by household and airborne droplets. Sometimes the parasite enters the body during blood transfusion from a sick person or during organ transplantation, so the disease can be caught solely due to the negligence of doctors.

Kinds

Toxoplasmosis is usually divided into several types, depending on the type of infection and the severity of symptoms. So, by the nature of the course, acute and chronic toxoplasmosis are distinguished, in the first case the problem develops quickly, the symptoms are pronounced, in the second case it has a sluggish character and practically does not manifest itself.

Toxoplasmosis can be in a child already at birth, or it can be transmitted during life:

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  1. Congenital toxoplasmosis - infection occurs when the unborn child is in the womb. If a woman is sick with parasites while carrying a baby, they can penetrate the placenta and infect the baby. Infection carries a huge danger for the unborn child, sometimes the parasite provokes a frozen pregnancy and the death of the fetus in the womb. If a child is born, he may be diagnosed with problems with the nervous system, eyes and other organs.
  2. Acquired toxoplasmosis. Less dangerous than congenital, often occurs without visible symptoms, especially if it goes into the chronic stage. Acute toxoplasmosis is similar in symptoms to typhoid fever - the patient's body temperature rises, fever appears, the spleen and liver increase significantly in size, with damage to the nervous system, the patient complains of severe headache, convulsions, nausea and vomiting. In the chronic stage of the disease, lymph nodes may increase, the temperature rises slightly, and the liver enlarges.

Symptoms

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Symptoms of pathology

As mentioned above, in most cases the disease has no pronounced symptoms and proceeds latently. The infected can learn about problems in the body many months after the infection process. With a congenital disease, jaundice, thrombocytopenia develops, and a rash appears. If a parasite is infected in early pregnancy, miscarriage can be caused.

The incubation period of the parasite upon penetration into the human body is 2-3 weeks, during this time, almost 90% of the diseased begin to develop antibodies and immunity.

In the acute stage of the disease, the patient has all the symptoms of meningitis or infection with an encephalitis tick. So, the optic nerve is damaged, and a few weeks after the onset of the disease, in the absence of proper treatment, myocarditis develops. In the acute stage of the disease, patients may experience severe headache, with enlargement of the spleen and liver, severe weakness throughout the body, with muscle spasms and cramps in the limbs, with swollen lymph nodes in the neck.

In advanced cases, toxoplasmosis can cause fatal brain damage, eye damage, and complete loss of vision. Further developing, toxoplasmosis provokes mental paralysis and remained.

What to do with toxoplasmosis

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What to do with toxoplasmosis

The disease in most cases proceeds without pronounced symptoms. If you have pets at home or in the recent past there was a fact of eating uncooked meat, you must definitely contact your doctor and undergo all the necessary examinations that will help confirm or deny the diagnosis of toxoplasmosis.

It is impossible to make a diagnosis only on the basis of the patient's complaints and external examination, this is due to the fact that toxoplasmosis has nonspecific symptoms that are characteristic of some other diseases. Most often, if there is a suspicion of the presence of parasites in the body, the doctor directs the patient to an analysis of the coagulation reaction, the reaction of immune enzymes, the PCR analysis. With toxoplasmosis, methods for detecting parasites in biological fluids are practically not used, since the parasite sometimes does not manifest itself in this way at all.

The best results for the detection of toxoplasmosis are shown by an enzyme immunoassay, in which not only specific antibodies are detected in the body, but their quantity is also determined.

What is IgM and IgG

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A few days after infection with toxoplasmosis, the patient begins to produce antibodies - IgM immunoglobulins. Antibodies remain in the body for about a year after infection, then disappear. Some time after infection, another IgG antibodies are attached to the immunoglobulin, they remain in the body throughout life and indicate the development of strong immunity.

Thus, if, when tested for toxoplasmosis, you have positive IgM and negative IgG, this means that the infection with the parasite has occurred recently, and the body has not yet had time to develop stable immunity. If toxoplasmosis IgG is positive and immunoglobulin is negative, we can say that the body has developed strong immunity, and the disease is in the past. In some patients, the test results show a positive result for IgM and IgG, in this case it is necessary to pass an additional test two weeks after the first one to clarify the results.

Positive IgG toxoplasmosis during pregnancy suggests that the fetus is under reliable immunity protection, and the mother has nothing to worry about. Negative results for these antibodies may occur if the patient has not yet encountered the disease.

Toxoplasmosis treatment

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Toxoplasmosis treatment

Treatment of toxoplasmosis with drugs is not always effective, sometimes the parasite forms cysts in the host's body, which are protected from the effects of drugs.

It is necessary to treat the problem only if severe symptoms are observed. Most often, patients are prescribed a combination of chemotherapy drugs and antibiotics. Treatment will be effective in the acute stage of the disease.

If a patient is diagnosed with chronic toxoplasmosis, chemotherapy treatment will not give the expected results; in this case, the treatment is based on strengthening the patient's immune functions.

Therapy is necessary for women who are planning to conceive a child. It is advisable to sign up for a full medical examination before conceiving a child, if a problem is detected, complex treatment will be prescribed, the result of which will be the development of persistent immunity to the parasite.

If you suffer from infertility, or are faced with an abortion in the early stages, it is highly likely that toxoplasmosis interferes with giving birth to a child.

Sometimes, if the body's immune system is in a weakened state, antibodies to the parasite are not produced, serious complications begin to develop. Among the main complications, one can note the development of a serious infectious shock, cerebral edema with all the ensuing consequences, problems in the development of the child, and diseases of the cardiovascular system.

Problem prevention

To avoid infection with toxoplasmosis, you must:

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  1. Observe basic rules of personal hygiene, wash hands after the street, after using the toilet, before eating, after contact with pets or their excrement;

    2. Refuse to eat raw or undercooked meat;

    3. Pets must necessarily undergo veterinary examinations;

    4. It is advisable for pregnant women to refuse any contact with dogs or cats, otherwise there is a high probability of catching a parasite and losing a child.

Toxoplasmosis is a serious parasitic disease transmitted to humans from pets. If in some patients the disease proceeds without pronounced symptoms, the body independently produces IgG antibodies and stable immunity, then in others the problem provokes serious systemic changes in the body, which in some cases can lead to death.

It is important if any of the symptoms described above appear to seek medical help, undergo the necessary examinations and tests.

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