Seroepidemiologic Study of Brucellosis in Febrile Patients in Khartoum State

Abstract

Abstract Brucellosis is a zoonotic disease caused by bacteria of the genus Brucella. Humans are infected mostly due to animal contact especially through consumption of unpasteurized milk or its raw products from infected animals. Consumption and handling of other raw products’ of animals also constitute an important mode of transmission. Human brucellosis is a debilitating disease which is commonly misdiagnosed for other infectious and non-infectious febrile diseases. The objective of this study was to provide baseline data on human brucellosis among febrile patients in Khartoum State. The diagnosis of brucellosis case in this study depended on a clinical manifestation which was fever for at least two weeks coupled with serum antibody titre of 1:160 or more to Brucella melitensis or Brucella abortus by using Standard Tube agglutinatonTest technique. The prevalence of human brucellosis was 8.9% among febrile patients in Khartoum State. Sixty three (70.8%) of the brucellosis patients were males, and 26 (29.2%) were females. Males constituted a significantly high number of patients than females. The males to females ratio was 2.4: 1. Fifty four (60.7%) of the brucellosis patients had significant titres to Brucella melitensis with a mean serum titre of 1:373. Twenty three (25.8%) patients had significant titres to Brucella abortus with a mean serum titre of 1:327. Twelve (13.5 %) of the patients had significant titres to both Brucella melitensis and Brucella abortus with mean serum titres of 1:332 and 1:321 respectively. Risk factors for Human brucellosis include animal contact, particularly among people of certain occupations such as herdsmcn, milkmen and those involved in meat industry. In addition, males were more exposed to infection than females, while both males and females at their mid-forties were more susceptible to infection than other age groups. High index of clinical suspicion of human brucellosis is needed for early diagnosis and management of the disease. More studies on the biology and epidemiology of Brucella species are important so as to reach a rational strategy for diagnosis, treatment and prevention of the infection.