Official websites use. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. Corresponding author: Dr. Hymenolepis nana, also called dwarf tapeworm infection, is an intestinal helminth not previously reported in The Gambia and only very rarely reported in West Africa.
We report a case of H. The child presented with mild iron deficiency anaemia and granulocytosis but was otherwise mostly asymptomatic despite the moderate-intensity of infection. We support treatment of H. Hymenolepiasis is a neglected tropical disease and a type of helminthiasis infection which in humans is most commonly caused by Hymenolepis nana, often referred to as dwarf tapeworm.
Hymenolepiasis frequently occurs in arid, warm and resource-poor regions [ 1 - 3 ], with the highest prevalence observed in children under years-old, and an estimated 50 - 75 million carriers worldwide [ 4 - 7 ].
Very few reports of H. There is a report of H. Another report, in Ethiopia, showed that H. However, human infection with H. Due to this trait, the majority of infections occur as auto-infections, particularly in immune- compromised hosts, as a result of ingesting water or food contaminated by human faeces containing eggs [ 12 ].
Eggs passed in stool are immediately infective and this human-to-human transmission of eggs by the faecal-oral route is the most common route of infection, particularly in environments with poor hygiene and inappropriate sanitation. The ingested eggs hatch in the small intestine releasing a motile embryo, the oncosphere, which invades a villus and develops into the larval cysticercoid in about 4 weeks.
