What parasite causes Fascioliasis?
What parasite causes Fascioliasis?
Fascioliasis is an infectious disease caused by Fasciola parasites, which are flat worms referred to as liver flukes. The adult (mature) flukes are found in the bile ducts and liver of infected people and animals, such as sheep and cattle.
What is the parasite form of Fasciola hepatica?
Fasciola hepatica, also known as the common liver fluke or sheep liver fluke, is a parasitic trematode (fluke or flatworm, a type of helminth) of the class Trematoda, phylum Platyhelminthes. It infects the livers of various mammals, including humans, and is transmitted by sheep and cattle to humans the world over.
What are the most common symptoms of Fasciola hepatica?
More usually the invasive phase lasts many weeks, with the most common symptoms being intermittent fever, hepatomegaly, and abdominal pain, although up to 50% of infections may be subclinical. Abdominal pain is usually in the epigastrium or right hypochondrium. Other symptoms include malaise and wasting.
Can Fasciola Miracidia infect humans?
Fasciola has a complex lifecycle that involves intermediate snail and definitive mammal hosts, including humans. Eggs shed in the stool of the definitive host embryonate in fresh water releasing a single miracidium. The miracidium penetrates the tegument of the snail intermediate host to cause infection.
Is Fasciola a tapeworm?
Fasciolosis is a parasitic worm infection caused by the common liver fluke Fasciola hepatica as well as by Fasciola gigantica. The disease is a plant-borne trematode zoonosis, and is classified as a neglected tropical disease (NTD)….
| Fasciolosis | |
|---|---|
| Frequency | 2 millions |
Why liver fluke are called Digenetic parasites?
– Liver flukes spend their life cycle utilising two hosts. They live as an internal parasite in the vertebrates during their sexual reproduction phase while have asexual reproduction phase when they are prsesnt in mollusc. Hence they are digenetic organisms.
How do humans typically acquire a Fasciola infection?
People usually become infected by eating raw watercress or other water plants contaminated with immature parasite larvae. The young worms move through the intestinal wall, the abdominal cavity, and the liver tissue, into the bile ducts, where they develop into mature adult flukes that produce eggs.
How do I know if I have Fasciola hepatica?
The standard way to be sure a person is infected with Fasciola is by seeing the parasite. This is usually done by finding Fasciola eggs in stool (fecal) specimens examined under a microscope. More than one specimen may need to be examined to find the parasite.
