Prevalence of intestinal parasites from fingernails of primary school going children of district Lahore

Abstract

Intestinal parasitic infections are widely distributed throughout the world and children are the most affected population. In primary schools environments children have proven to be more susceptible for acquiring Intestinal parasites (IP) through fingernails. The present study was carried out to assess the prevalence of intestinal parasites in children of primary schools of district Lahore. 300 nail samples were collected from primary school children of different ages and sexes. The parasites were isolated from the fingernail dirt of both sexes and prevalence was recorded. The collected data was analyzed using SPSS version 20. The prevalence of parasites was presented as descriptive statistics, while the relationship between several variables (age, gender, educational levels) and presence of parasites was determined by chi-square test. The level of significance used was P<0.05. The highest prevalence was observed for Enterobius vermicularis, was (23.8%) whereas lowest prevalence was found for Taenia saginata, (4.76%). The other parasites found were, Trichuris trichiura, (9.52%), Ascaris lumbricoides, (9.52%), Entamoeba histolytica and Entamoeba coli (14.28%), Giardia lamblia, (14.28%) and Hymenolepis nana, (9.52%). Overall prevalence was found to be 21%.   Key words: Intestinal parasites, parasitic diseases, primary schools children, prevalence.