Leishmania
tsmith | June 17, 2013Student guest post by Naomi Kirschenbaum
Although we can never know, there are estimates in the range of 15,000 displaced pets in the wake of 2005 Hurricane Katrina. Many of the dogs found their way to shelters and homes in our community around the Monterey Bay in California. As a local veterinarian the most notable observation I saw was how it “seemed” that so many were heartworm positive. Six years later we have a published study finding a 48.8% prevalence of heartworm in these dogs.
This story is an example of a few important lessons. First, how things seemed to me, in my clinical…
cwilcox | August 24, 2009Ah, the joys of a tropical getaway. There's warm, clear waters, soft, sandy beaches, and of course, a whole ton of amazing parasites waiting to gorge on your delicious flesh.
Anyone who has traveled out of the US has been told horror stories of the disgusting creatures that await them. Take a nice trip to Brazil for some sightseeing, for example, and you might find yourself at the mercy of a small, intracellular protozoan parasite of the genus Leishmania.
There are many species of Leishmania living all over the world, from Saudi Arabia to Texas. No one's entirely sure how the parasites ended…