Human brucellosis in Portugal-Retrospective analysis of suspected clinical cases of infection from 2009 to 2016

Brucellosis is a zoonosis that is emerging in some regions of the world. Although brucellosis is a disease of obligatory declaration and is not eradicated in Portugal, no prevalence data is available in this country. In this study, we retrospectively analyzed the data available at the Reference Labo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2017-07, Vol.12 (7), p.e0179667-e0179667
Main Authors: Pelerito, Ana, Cordeiro, Rita, Matos, Rita, Santos, Maria Augusta, Soeiro, Sofia, Santos, João, Manita, Carla, Rio, Carla, Santo, M, Paixão, Eleonora, Nunes, Alexandra, Núncio, Sofia
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adolescent
Adult
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Animals
Biological & chemical terrorism
Biological properties
Biological samples
Biology and Life Sciences
Brucellosis
Brucellosis - epidemiology
Child
Data processing
Epidemiology
Female
Humans
Identification
Immunology
Infections
Infectious diseases
Laboratories
Male
Medicine and Health Sciences
Methods
Middle Aged
Outbreaks
People and Places
Polymerase chain reaction
Portugal - epidemiology
Research and Analysis Methods
Retrospective Studies
Serology
Young Adult
Zoonoses
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Summary:Brucellosis is a zoonosis that is emerging in some regions of the world. Although brucellosis is a disease of obligatory declaration and is not eradicated in Portugal, no prevalence data is available in this country. In this study, we retrospectively analyzed the data available at the Reference Laboratory at the Portuguese National Institute of Health during the past 7 years (2009-2016) in order to get insight into the epidemiological scenario of brucellosis in Portugal. A total of 2313 biological samples from patients with clinical suspicion of brucellosis were subjected to immunological techniques for laboratory diagnosis. From 2010 to 2015, a subset of 259 samples was subjected to molecular methods. According to the available data, 167 out of 2313 (7.2%) samples had positive serology for Brucella spp. and 43 out of 259 samples (16.6%) were positive for B. melitensis by real time PCR, being classified as biovar 1 and 3. This study draws attention to the importance of integrating clinical and laboratory data of human cases in order to increase the efficacy of the response measures in case of outbreaks.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0179667