DISCUSSION OUTLINE

I. Historical development of Parasitology

II. Definition of Terms

III. Kinds of Parasites, Vectors and Hosts

IV. Phases of Parasitism

V. Incubation Period

VI. Immunity

VII. Epidemiology

VIII. Diagnosis, Treatment, Prevention and Control of Parasitoses

ANCIENT HISTORY
• The Ebers papyrus, written about 1600 BC, contains references
to the presence of parasitic worms in man.

• The laws of the Mosaic code prohibiting the consumption of

meat from unclean animals indicate that the early Israelites had
knowledge about parasitic infections.

• There is also evidence of parasitic recognition among the Roman,

Greek, Persian, and Phoenician scientists.

• Chinese doctors were aware of parasites as early as 300 BC.

MODERN HISTORY
• The liver fluke Fasciola hepatica was discovered by Jehan
de Brie in 1379 from sheep.

• Anton Van Leewenhoek described the morphology of the

protozoan Giardia lamblia from his own stool.

• In 1880, Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran demonstrated

the intracellular parasites of malaria.

• These are but a few of the many discoveries made

in the nineteenth and twentieth century that expande
d the field of parasitology.
MISCONCEPTIONS
• Parasites were thought to be beneficial to humans during
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

• For example, many people believed that lice protected children

from disease and leeches were used extensively for blood
letting as a cure.

• For a time, intestinal parasites were thought to help in cleaning

the tract of excess food and waste and until recently, the
Chinese believed that powdered Ascaris was helpful for
medicinal treatment of impotency.

• In France, the heads of tapeworms (scolices) were once used as

weight control measures.
PRESENT IDEOLOGY
• Modern medicine has recognized the pathogenic effects of
parasites and is searching for drugs useful in the treatment of
parasitic infections.

• Prevention is the best method to attack the problem of

parasites. Therefore, to prevent and to treat parasitic
infections, the life cycles of the parasites must be known. To
this end, much time and money have been invested in the
eradication of vectors (carriers)that spread parasites. In fact,
the fauna (animal life) and flora (plant life) of entire regions
have been changed in an attempt to disrupt the
reproduction of Schistosoma in some snails.
• Traditionally, parasitology has been concerned with the
harmful effects of organisms living and feeding inside or on
another living organism.

• Although parasites may belong to any of the following

groups – bacteria, yeast, fungi, algae, viruses, protozoa,
helminths and arthropods – in effect parasitologists have
focused on the internal zooparasites.

• Bacteria, viruses and fungi of plant origin are the

provenance of microbiologists.

• Before the discovery of unicellular parasites c. 1880s

onwards, worms or helminths were the major focus of
attention.
PARASITE
- Greek words: “para” = near & “sites” = food
- Is a living organism which for the purpose of procuring
food & shelter take up their abode temporarily, on or
within another living organism
- the one organism, usually the physically smaller of the
two (the parasite) benefits and the other (the host) is
harmed
- may be temporary, facultative, or obligatory
- This relationship can be loose or mostly intimate, and for
the parasite, it is usually obligatory.
IN PARASITISM, THERE IS ALWAYS
EXPLOITATION AND HARM.
 Entamoeba coli Entamoeba histolytica

Source: Entamoeba coli parasite | Medical Source: What is the microbiology of liver
Laboratories (medical-labs.net) abscess? - The Hospitalist (the-hospitalist.org)

- May be nonpathogenic (Entamoeba coli) or definitely

pathogenic & live at the expense of the host causing
it harm (Entamoeba histolytica).
 Macroparasites - are multicellular parasites that are visible to
the naked human eye, such as helminth parasites (parasitic
worms, such as flukes, tapeworms, and roundworms, or
nematodes).
https://alchetron.com/
Schistosoma-
japonicum

Schistosoma-
japonicum
adult male

Taenia solium adult

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/322340

Ascaris lumbricoides males

https://www.scmp.com/news/world/united-states-
canada/article/3013517/new-york-surgeons-find-tapeworm-
rachel-palmas-brain
Microparasites are small, generally, unicellular and invisible to
the naked eye, such as protozoan parasites.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wi https://www.pinterest.ph/pin/147141112
ki/Entamoeba_histolytica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balantidium_coli
804990416/

Entamoeba Giardia lamblia Balantidium coli

histolytica trophozoites trophozoites
trophozoite
 BASIC TYPES OF
PARASITISM AND
TERMINOLOGY
➢ As a parasite has to break through the different
layers of defense mechanisms of the host in order to
localize and thrive on the host, the parasite must be
equipped with specialized mechanisms.

➢ The relationship, therefore, is generally strongly

species specific; in other words, a particular parasite
can infect only a particular host, not any other.
 The parasite causes harm to the host in many ways:
1) depriving the host of digested food;

2) erecting mechanical blockades of food, blood, lymph,

and bile passages;

3) and causing tissue damages by rupture, enzymatic

digestion, induction of autolysis, or secretion of toxins.

https://web.stanford.edu/gr
oup/parasites/ParaSites20
06/Leishmaniasis/Mucocut
aneous.htm

http://www.infectionlandscapes.org/ https://www.sciencephoto.com/m https://www.pinterest.ph/pin/24565

2011/12/ascariasis.html edia/494409/view/elephantiasis 7354654191789/
 KINDS OF
PARASITES
1) ECTOPARASITE
– lives on surface of the host
– have elaborate mechanisms and strategies for finding hosts. Some
aquatic leeches, e.g., locate hosts by sensing movement and then
confirm their identity through skin temperature and chemical cues
before attaching.

EXAMPLES: TICKS, LICE, LEECHES, MITES & FLEAS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anopheles
2) ENDOPARASITE
- lives within the host
- Many endoparasites acquire hosts through entrance of the tissue,
as well as through consumption of raw foods

ROUNDWORMS & TAPEWORMS IN THE GUT

https://journal.cosecsa.org/index.php/ECAJS/article/vie
w/20190015/1602
 CLASSIFICATION
ACCORDING TO NEEDS
FOR A HOST
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ascaris

1) OBLIGATORY PARASITE
- majority of parasites are obligatory parasites and are totally
dependent on the host for food, shelter, and/or protection;
they cannot survive without the host.
2) FACULTATIVE PARASITE
– one capable of choosing either a free-living or a
parasitic existence. e.g S.stercoralis & Naegleria fowleri

Strongyloides
stercoralis
Life cycle

https://www.msdmanuals.com/prof
essional/infectious-
diseases/nematodes-
roundworms/strongyloidiasis
 3) SPURIOUS PARASITE
– a parasite of another animal which pass through the
human body without further development or without
causing any injury or damage.
https://www.technologynetworks.com/immunology/
news/blood-clotting-ability-of-leeches-revealed-
306085

https://www.pestworld
.org/pest-guide/bed-
bugs/bed-bugs/

https://www.cdc.gov/dpdx/hepaticcapillariasi
s/index.html

4) INTERMITTENT PARASITE
- visits & leaves their hosts at intervals like that during its feeding time.
- a.k.a. temporary parasite
- (leeches, bed bugs) visit their host only for a short period of time.
ACCORDING TO PATHOGENECITY
1) Pathogenic - (of a bacterium, virus, or
other microorganism) causing disease.
2) Non-pathogenic - incapable of
causing disease.
 ACCORDING TO WHERE THEY ARE FOUND

1) Coprophilic parasite – it is a protozoan organism which is able to

live and multiply in moist fecal matter outside the body.
2) Hematozoic parasite – is a parasite living inside a red blood cell,
e.g. Plasmodium
3) Cytozoic Parasite – is a parasite living inside the cell or tissue, e.g.
Plasmodium, Isospora hominis
4)Coelozoic parasite – it is the parasite living in body
cavities, e.g. Acanthocheilonema perstans
5)Enterozoic parasite – it is the parasite living inside the
lumen of the intestines, e.g. Ascaris lumbricoides
 OTHER TERMS

1) HYPERPARASITE OR SECONDARY PARASITE

- parasite within a parasite; i.e. malaria in mosquitoes, tapeworm
larvae in fleas.
- sometimes referred to as "hyperparasitoidism"
 Strongyloides
stercoralis egg

2) PSEUDOPARASITE
– an object that is mistaken for a parasite
https://instruction.cvhs.okstate.edu/jcfox/htdocs/clinpara/lst1_10.htm
 https://bloodsuckersforbullions.weebly.com/store/p5/Taenia_solium.html

https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/cysticercosis/biology.html

3) WANDERING OR ABBERANT PARASITE

- one which is never transmitted from man to man & which develops
abnormally in man.
- instead of arriving at the site of infection in the definitive host, reach an
unusual place as a dead end, becoming unable to complete the life cycle. For
example, the tapeworm Taenia solium may migrate to the brain and remain
there unless removed via an operation.
4) MONOXENOUS – these parasites have only one host,
rest of the cycle being spent outside the host
(e.g. Entamoeba histolytica; a.k.a. monogenic parasites)

5) HETEROXENOUS – these parasites have two or more

hosts, usually belonging to parasite widely separated
taxonomic groups (e.g. Taenia, various flukes)

- a.k.a. digenetic parasite needs, in addition to a

primary host, also a secondary host to complete
the entire life cycle. Plasmodium vivax (malaria
parasite) completes its asexual part of life cycle
in people and the sexual part in the female
Anopheles mosquito. https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/tae
niasis/biology.html
 6) DIOECIOUS – having female &
male reproductive organs in different
individuals; or separate sexes (e.g.
nematodes, schistosomes)
https://clinicalgate.com/trichuriasis-
trichuris-trichiura/

7) MONOECIOUS – having female

and male reproductive organs in
same individual; hermaphroditic
(e.g. tapeworms)
https://www.gponline.com/tapeworm-infestation- returned-
traveller/infections-and-infestations/infections- and-
infestations/article/1284578
The Most Disturbing Parasites Found Inside Humans! | Monsters Inside Me - YouTube
 VECTORS – transmit parasites from
host to host.
a) Biological Vector - essential in the life cycle of a parasite.
b) Mechanical Vector - unessential in the life cycle of a parasite
(e.g. cysts of intestinal protozoa carried over to food by legs of
vectors.
c) Anthropophilic Vector – when the vector prefers human blood
when it is available.
d) Zoophilic Vector – when the vector prefers animal blood when it is
available.

ZOONOSIS – literally means “diseases of animals”

– now used to describe those diseases of
animals, which are transmittable to humans.
 TYPES OF HOSTS
1) DEFINITIVE OR FINAL HOST
- host in which parasite reaches sexual maturity & reproduces.
- is usually the main host. For digenetic parasites, it is the host for the adult
stage and for the completion of sexual part of life cycle.
- e.g. humans (Schistosomes), mosquito (Plasmodium vivax)

https://mcdinternational.org/trainings/malaria/english/dp dx5/HTML/Frames/S-
Z/Schistosomiasis/body_Schistosomiasis_page1
 https://www.cdc.gov/dpdx/cl onorchiasis/index.html

2) INTERMEDIATE HOST /SECONDARY HOST

- Some development in host, but does not reach sexual maturity; often
asexual stages.
- is a temporary environment, but one that is essential for the completion
of a particular parasite's life cycle.
- true for digenetic parasites
- e.g. snails (Clonorchis sinensis)
 3) PARATENIC HOST - an IH in which no development of the
parasite occurs, although its presence may
be required as an essential link in the
completion of the parasite's life cycle
- e.g. the successive fish hosts that carry the plerocercoid of D. latum, to
larger food fish eventually eaten by humans or other final hosts.

Plerocercoid
Larvae
(sparganum)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diphyllobothrium
 The Roof rat (Rattus rattus) is
a reservoir host of bubonic
plague with the oriental rat
fleas that infest them being a
prime vector of the disease.

https://www.lookandlearn.com/history-
images/A016046/Rat-leaving-a-ship-carrying-
the-bubonic-plague

4) RESERVOIR HOST
- Non-human animals that serve as sources of infection to humans.
- It can harbor a pathogen indefinitely with no ill effects.
- are permissive host alternatives to definitive hosts, such that the
infective stage can be passed from the host to the population of
the definitive host.
5) SUSCEPTIBLE HOST - one that is readily infected by a particular
parasite.

6) PERMISSIVE HOST - is either a definitive, intermediate, or

accidental host that allows the parasite to complete its life cycle in
part or the whole.

7) NON-PERMISSIVE HOST - is a host organism other than true

definitive host, which receives the parasite but the parasite finds
itself in a dead end.
 PHASES OF PARASITISM
- For a parasite to establish itself in its host, it must undergo various
stages/ phases:

A. Contact & Entry to the Host:

- This involves EXPOSURE (the act/ process of introduction of the
parasite to its host) from one or more sources as:

1) Contaminated soil – oral ingestion

2) Contaminated water – oral ingestion

3) Food containing the immature infective stage of the parasite.

4) Skin penetration from bites of arthropod vector or
from direct penetration of infective forms.

5) A domestic or wild animal harboring the parasite

6) Another person, his clothing, bedding, or immediate

environment which he has contaminated.
7) Airborne transmission

8) Transplacental (i.e. congenital)

9) Blood transmission

10) One’s self - autoinfection

B. Migration of parasite in the host to its habitat.

C. Maturation & Reproduction

- involves the parasite’s use of the host’s nutrients for
growth, energy and multiplication.

Biological Incubation Period

- period related to the development of the parasite.
- starts w/ the entry of the parasite to its host & ends as soon
as the parasite or their products can be demonstrated in the
feces or other excreta or in the circulating blood (parasitemia),
by aspiration, biopsy or other diagnostic procedure.
Clinical Incubation Period
- refers to the interval between exposure & the earliest evidence of
symptoms produced as a result of the infection (or infestation).
Infection
- is the entry & development or multiplication of a pathogen in
the body of man or animals.
Infestation
- is the lodgment, development & reproduction of arthropods on
the surface of the body or in the clothing of man, or the fur of
animals.
THE ENVIRONMENT
- The presence or absence of a no. of biological, chemical & physical factors in the
environment directly or indirectly affects the densities & distribution of
parasites. These are:

1) Flora – vegetation that serves as food & shelter for hosts, both definitive &
intermediate, greatly influences parasite population.

2) Fauna – animal population constitute potential hosts for parasites so that the
latter can maintain themselves.
3) Water – some infective forms of parasites are free-swimming & requires water
to migrate & reach its host.

4) Host population density & behavior

- population densities of transport, intermediate & definitive hosts affect
parasite population densities.
5) Influence of Seasons/ Climate/ Temperature/ Humidity
 DIAGNOSIS, TREATMENT, PREVENTION AND
CONTROL OF PARASITOSES
Diagnosis has 2 methods of approach:
1) Clinical (based of medical signs and reported symptoms, rather than
diagnostic tests)
2) Laboratory (based significantly on laboratory reports or test results,
rather than the physical examination of the patient.
Epidemiology - the branch of medicine which deals with the incidence,
distribution, and possible control of diseases and other factors relating to health.

Epidemiologic studies
1) Provide info on the prevalence of parasites in a population.
2) It will indicate whether the infections are endemic, hyperendemic, epidemic &
sporadic.
3) It will provide clues as to the sources of exposure.
4) It will direct attention to the amount of illness in the community for the
application of control/preventive measures.
PREVALENCE RATE - the frequency of occurrence of a disease in a
population in a certain period of time.
- It includes old & new cases; & is usually expressed in %.
INCIDENCE RATE - the frequency of occurrence of a disease (involving new cases
only) in a popl’n for a certain pd of time. (%)
MORTALITY RATE – expresses the frequency of deaths among those having the
disease in a community. It is expressed in deaths per 100,000 per year.
MORBIDITY RATE – expresses the frequency of being sick of the disease; & is
commonly reported as cases of notifiable disease per 1,000 per year.
ENDEMIC – when disease in the human population maintains a relatively
steady, moderate level; always present
HYPERENDEMIC – if prevalence is high
EPIDEMIC – if there is a sharp rise in the incidence or an outbreak of considerable
intensity occurs
SPORADIC – if it appears only occasionally in one or at most a few members of the
community.
EPIDEMICITY
– typically results from introduction of an agent or a new strain into a community
Once accurate specific diagnosis has been made the ff
points must be considered before proceeding w/
treatment:

1) severity, duration & intensity of infection & the

probability of reinfection.

2) efficacy, availability, toxicity, & acceptability of the

treatment.
- chemotherapy, surgical intervention (e.g.
lesions found in the brain or eye produced
by Cysticercus cellulosae
CONTROL
- of a disease means its restraint
- in the patient = may constitute symptomatic relief or repression
of the activities of the causative agent but not its elimination.

PREVENTION
- in public health = a check to sufficiently remove the likelihood of
further dissemination of an epidemic or to reduce the prevalence
of disease in a population.
- implies interception, so that the individuals in a community are
no longer exposed to the hazards of the disease.
A prerequisite to control & prevention of the parasitoses is a clear
understanding of the epidemiology of each causative org. such as:

a) the distinctive characteristics of the parasite.

b) the conditions under which it survives & propagates.
c) the means of exposure & transmission to man & other hosts.
The practicing physician can contribute to their control
in the following ways:
a) the detection, accurate diagnosis & evaluation of the
clinical importance of the disease in the patient;
b) adequate treatment of the patient;
c) search for & treatment of other cases in the
patient’s family;
d) determination, if possible, of the source of the infection,
prompt reporting to health officials;
e) advise to patients & their families as to how they can avoid
further exposure;
f) Support & cooperation in community preventive
measures;
g) Education of patients in ways utilizing & strengthening
local health departments.
Methods applicable to the control & prevention of
parasitic diseases are directed to anyone or all of the
components of parasitism; & are designed to cut a link in
the parasitic cycle.

a) Measures directed to the HOST

- prompt examination & treatment of human
cases.

b) Measures directed against the PARASITE

- use of synthetic & natural chemical
preparations that are parasiticidal.
c) Measures directed against the VECTOR, RESERVOIR
HOSTS & OTHER ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS.

- application of chemicals to eradicate or kill

arthropod vectors.

- application of molluscides on bodies of fresh to

brackish H2O to kill snails.

- control thru environmental sanitation & sanitary

waste disposal.
 How can a parasite
possibly live in my
body and I don't even
know it is there?
The purpose of a parasite is to not
make itself known.

A smart parasite lives without

being detected because if it is
detected, of course, something is
going to be done to eradicate it.
If you think parasites are stupid, think
again.

They are highly intelligent organisms.

Not intelligent in the same way humans

are, but they are intelligent in their ability
to survive and reproduce, which is of
course, the purpose of any organism on
this planet.