Seroepidemiology of Toxoplasma gondii infection in pregnant women in a public hospital in northern Mexico.
BACKGROUND
Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii) infection in pregnant women represents a risk for congenital disease. There is scarce information about the epidemiology of T. gondii infection in pregnant women in Mexico. Therefore, we sought to determine the prevalence of T. gondii infection and associated socio-demographic, clinical and behavioural characteristics in a population of pregnant women of Durango City, Mexico.


METHODS
Three hundred and forty three women seeking prenatal care in a public hospital of Durango City in Mexico were examined for T. gondii infection. All women were tested for anti-T. gondii IgM and IgG antibodies by using IMx Toxo IgM and IMx Toxo IgG 2.0 kits (Abbott Laboratories, Abbott Park, IL, USA), respectively. Socio-demographic, clinical and behavioural characteristics from each participant were also obtained.


RESULTS
Twenty one out of the 343 (6.1%) women had IgG anti-T. gondii antibodies. None of the 343 women had IgM anti-T. gondii antibodies. Multivariate analysis using logic regression showed that T. gondii infection was associated with living in a house with soil floor (adjusted OR = 7.16; 95% CI: 1.39-36.84), residing outside of Durango State (adjusted OR = 4.25; 95% CI: 1.72-10.49), and turkey meat consumption (adjusted OR = 3.85; 95% CI: 1.30-11.44). Other characteristics as cat contact, gardening, and food preferences did not show any association with T. gondii infection.


CONCLUSIONS
The prevalence of T. gondii infection in pregnant women of Durango City is low as compared with those reported in other regions of Mexico and the majority of other countries. Poor housing conditions as soil floors, residing in other Mexican States, and turkey meat consumption might contribute to acquire T. gondii infection.
Alvarado-Esquivel
Cosme
C
Faculty of Medicine, Juárez University of Durango State (UJED), Durango, Mexico. alvaradocosme@yahoo.com
Sifuentes-Alvarez
Antonio
A
Narro-Duarte
Sergio Guadalupe
SG
Estrada-Martínez
Sergio
S
Díaz-García
Juan Humberto
JH
Liesenfeld
Oliver
O
Martínez-García
Sergio Arturo
SA
Canales-Molina
Arturo
A
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000818:Animals; D005260:Female; D006779:Hospitals, Public; D006801:Humans; D007074:Immunoglobulin G / Q000097:blood; D008461:Meat Products / Q000469:parasitology; D008800:Mexico / Q000453:epidemiology; D011247:Pregnancy; D015597:Pregnancy Complications, Parasitic / Q000453:epidemiology*; D015995:Prevalence; D016036:Seroepidemiologic Studies; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D014122:Toxoplasma / Q000276:immunology; D014123:Toxoplasmosis / Q000453:epidemiology*
D007074:Immunoglobulin G