Deepinder Chhina, Daaman Sharma, Rama Gupta and Gagandeep Singh
Dayanand Medical College & Hospital, India
Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Neurol Neurophysiol
Neurocysticercosis, a helminthic disease of the central nervous system, is a leading cause of epilepsy in worldwide. The high prevalence in developing countries is due to greater frequency of infectious diseases. A two phase survey including epilepsy screening questionnaire, neurological assessment, EEG and MRI was carried out. Controls were selected from the same community. The sera of enrolled patients were assayed to detect antibodies against Taenia solium. The crude prevalence of active epilepsy was 7.2 per 1,000. The prevalence of antibodies against T. solium was 25.5% (27 of 106) in people with active epilepsy, significantly higher than in controls (12.3%; 13 of 106 cases; p = 0.02). Adjusted conditional (fixed-effects) logistic regression estimated an odds ratio of 2.8 (95% confidence interval 1.2-6.8) for detection of T. solium antibodies. Nineteen people with active epilepsy demonstrated evidence of neurocysticercosis (NCC) on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), including 7 (36.5%) with solitary cysticercus granuloma. A significant association between T. solium exposure and epilepsy was observed.
Deepinder has completed her MD from Punjab University. She is the head of department of Microbiology at Dayanand Medical College and Hospital and has published more than 80 papers in reputed journals. She has been the editor of the Journal of gastrointestinal infections (India) from 2011-2014 and is the General secretary of “Gastrointestinal infection society of India” from year 2015.
Email: drrajoosingh@gmail.com
