Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Human Stool Parasites Challenge

Case: 46 years old tourist guide from Philippines has weight loss and chronic abdominal pain. Stool specimen for parasites were taken and the findings are in the image below. The size of the found particles is around 140 x 80micrometers.

Can you identify these particles? 

Correct answer is below the image.

















Correct answer: Eggs of Fasciola hepatica or Fasciolopsis buski.

The size of eggs is an important feature in differentiating F. hepatica/F. buski eggs from the similar-appearing but smaller eggs of Diphyllobothrium and Paragonimus. Unfortunately it is not possible to reliably differentiate the eggs of F. hepatica and F. buski by morphology alone. 

Source: Creepy dreathful wonderful parasites
Image credits: Bobbi Pritt

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