Abstract
One of the most important modes of transmission of Trypanosoma cruzi infection in areas where it is not endemic is vertical transmission: from mother to child. The objective of this report is to assess the efficacy of different programmes of serological screening to monitor infection with T. cruzi in pregnant Latin American women living in Madrid (Spain). To achieve this, a retrospective study was undertaken from January 2008 to December 2010 in seven hospitals in the Autonomous Community of Madrid. Serological screening programmes were classified in two main strategies: a selective one (pregnant women from Bolivia) and a universal one (pregnant women from Latin America). A total of 3,839 pregnant women were tested and the overall prevalence was 3.96%. The rate of congenital transmission was 2.6%. The current monitoring programmes have variable coverage ranging between 26% (selective screening) and 100% (universal screening). Monitoring of pregnant women from Latin America only reaches full coverage if universal screening of pregnant women is carried out at any moment of pregnancy, including at delivery. A common national regulation is necessary in order to ensure homogenous implementation of screening.
Highlights
In the last ten years, due to the increase in the immigrant population from Latin America, Trypanosoma cruzi infection has become one of the most common imported parasitoses in Spain
The prevalence of T. cruzi antibodies in the donors coming from endemic areas was 0.8% and 75% of those who tested positive were from Bolivia [3]
All pregnant Bolivian women were considered to be from a high-risk area, and the rest of Latin American pregnant women were considered to come from low-risk areas
Summary
In the last ten years, due to the increase in the immigrant population from Latin America, Trypanosoma cruzi infection has become one of the most common imported parasitoses in Spain. Taking into account the data provided by the Spanish Statistical Institute (INE) in January 2010, 25.7% (429,826 of 1,670,196) of the immigrant population from T. cruzi-endemic areas were residing in the Autonomous Community of Madrid (Figure). Of this population, 39.1% (167,917 of 429,826) were women aged between 15 and 44 years [2]. The prevalence of T. cruzi antibodies in the donors coming from endemic areas was 0.8% and 75% of those who tested positive were from Bolivia [3]
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