Med. stages. A history of natural meat intake was recognized to be Rabbit Polyclonal to OR52N4 a risk factor related to toxoplasmosis. Therefore, to lower the risk of toxoplasmosis, pregnant women should refrain from eating natural and undercooked meat and maintain personal hygiene. INTRODUCTION Toxoplasmosis is usually a zoonosis caused by contamination with contamination and the associated risk factors also vary among countries. The seroprevalence of ranges from 6.1% to 74.5% among different regions of the world (1, 2, 9, 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 23, 24, 26C29). Numerous risk factors for toxoplasmosis have been reported, including childbearing age (3, 10, 26); previous pregnancy (3); consumption of natural meat (1, 6, 10, 11, 13, 16C18, 21, 23, 31); physical contact with cats (3, 7, 11, 13, 16, 18, SJG-136 20) and contaminated ground (16, 17, 27); consumption of unwashed natural vegetables or fruits (18, 20), unboiled water (10), and unpasteurized milk (29); low educational requirements (3, 18, 20); and residence in rural areas (18). In general, toxoplasmosis is usually asymptomatic in immunocompetent hosts and induces a self-limiting disease. However, contamination in pregnant women can pose severe health problems for the fetus. If infects a pregnant woman with no previous exposure to the parasite, it can migrate through the placenta into the fetus and subsequently cause congenital toxoplasmosis (4, 25, 31). Many of the clinical symptoms may present themselves in various forms in the fetus; these include hydrocephalus, retinochoroiditis, thrombocytopenia, mental retardation, epilepsy, and even fetal death (4, 11, 18, 19, 22, 30). Conversely, a lot of pregnant women have a history of contamination. It is particularly important to precisely determine whether contamination occurred in the early stage of pregnancy or before pregnancy because identification of the time of main contamination is crucial for the clinical management of pregnant women infected with antibodies are not detected in the early stages of pregnancy, we should consider the possibility of contamination during the later stages because all individuals are surrounded by some risk factors for toxoplasmosis. To the best of our knowledge, there is limited epidemiological information concerning toxoplasmosis in Japanese pregnant women. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the prevalence of anti-antibodies and the primary contamination rate of in Japanese pregnant women. We measured anti-antibodies in both early and late pregnancy and calculated the rate of anti-antibody seroconversion during pregnancy. This study also aimed to identify the possible risk factors associated with toxoplasmosis in Japan. MATERIALS AND METHODS The present study SJG-136 included a total of 4,466 pregnant women aged between 16 and 46 years (median age, 27.4 years) who received antenatal care in a private hospital located in Miyazaki Prefecture in Kyushu, Japan. Miyazaki Prefecture is located in the southeast region of Japan (approximately 31N, 130E), and it covers an area of 7,734 km2. This research was conducted over a period of 7. 5 years between July 1997 and December 2004. The subjects comprised 2,761 primiparous women, 1,468 women with a history of one pregnancy, and 237 women with a history of two pregnancies. After obtaining informed consent from your participants, we measured anti-antibodies in maternal blood. Pregnant women were tested for the presence of anti-antibodies using an assay kit for latex agglutination (LA) microtiters, called Toxotest-MT Eiken (provided by Eiken Chemical Co., Ltd., Japan), according to the manufacturer’s instructions. In this kit, LA titers of 1 1:32 or more are regarded to be a positive result. A 2 test was used to verify the rate of anti-antibody prevalence from your viewpoint of maternal age. Moreover, to determine the main contamination rate during pregnancy, we calculated the anti-antibody seroconversion rate in 2,696 subjects. Their antibodies were measured in both early and late pregnancy. The sampling interval was usually between the 14th and 16th week in the early stage of pregnancy and between the 30th and 32nd week in the SJG-136 late stage of pregnancy. The mean interval between antibody measurement in early and late pregnancy was 16.2 weeks. The focus of this survey was on lifestyle-related risk factors for toxoplasmosis. Therefore, we interviewed all participants at the first medical consultation.