title: Intestinal microsporidiosis in a Chilean patient with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).
abstract: A 24-year-old male patient with AIDS diagnosed in 1989, and with several episodes of pneumocystosis, was admitted because of a chronic diarrheic syndrome and severe epigastric pain. Endoscopy showed a granular duodenal mucosa. Light microscopy showed a moderate villous atrophy with round-cell inflammatory infiltration of the chorion. Giemsa, Ziehl-Neelsen, and Gram stains showed microsporidial spores measuring between 1.5 and 2 microns in the supranuclear cytoplasm of some enterocytes. Electron microscopy showed sporoblasts and spores consistent with Enterocytozoon bieneusi, with an apparently non-tubular, rather electron-dense polar filament showing up to 7 coils and also a microtubular internal structure with annular disposition, a finding which has not been adequately emphasized in the pertinent literature, probably representing a contractile property of the polar filament, rather than a mere duct for the parasitic sporoplasm to be inoculated.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anatomic Pathology, Pontificial Catholic University of Chile, School of Medicine, Santiago.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Oddó
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Chuaqui
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Hoffmann
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Garcia
mesh_terms: D000163:Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome / Q000150:complications*; D000328:Adult; D000818:Animals; D002677:Chile; D003967:Diarrhea / Q000469:parasitology*; D006801:Humans; D007411:Intestinal Diseases, Parasitic / Q000150:complications*; D008297:Male; D008854:Microscopy, Electron; D016816:Microsporida / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D011528:Protozoan Infections / Q000150:complications*