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Scientific article
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English

Estimates of the duration of the early and late stage of gambiense sleeping sickness

Contributors

Checchi, Francesco; Filipe, João A N.; Haydon, Daniel T.; Chandramohan, Daniel; Chappuis, François

Published in

BMC infectious diseases, vol. 8, 16

Publication date

2008

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The durations of untreated stage 1 (early stage, haemo-lymphatic) and stage 2 (late stage, meningo-encephalitic) human African trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness) due to Trypanosoma brucei gambiense are poorly quantified, but key to predicting the impact of screening on transmission. Here, we outline a method to estimate these parameters. METHODS: We first model the duration of stage 1 through survival analysis of untreated serological suspects detected during Médecins Sans Frontières interventions in Uganda and Sudan. We then deduce the duration of stage 2 based on the stage 1 to stage 2 ratio observed during active case detection in villages within the same sites. RESULTS: Survival in stage 1 appears to decay exponentially (daily rate = 0.0019; mean stage 1 duration = 526 days [95%CI 357 to 833]), possibly explaining past reports of abnormally long duration. Assuming epidemiological equilibrium, we estimate a similar duration of stage 2 (500 days [95%CI 345 to 769]), for a total of nearly three years in the absence of treatment. CONCLUSION: Robust estimates of these basic epidemiological parameters are essential to formulating a quantitative understanding of sleeping sickness dynamics, and will facilitate the evaluation of different possible control strategies.

Keywords

  • Adolescent
  • Adult
  • Animals
  • Child
  • Disease Progression
  • Female
  • Follow-Up Studies
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Prevalence
  • Sudan/epidemiology
  • Trypanosoma brucei gambiense
  • Trypanosomiasis, African/diagnosis/epidemiology
  • Uganda/epidemiology

UNIGE affiliation entities

UNIGE research groups

Citation (ISO format)

CHECCHI, Francesco et al. Estimates of the duration of the early and late stage of gambiense sleeping sickness. In: BMC infectious diseases, 2008, vol. 8, p. 16. doi: 10.1186/1471-2334-8-16

Main files (1)

Article (Accepted version)

Identifiers

Additional URL for this publication

http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2334/8/16

Journal ISSN

1471-2334
621views
411downloads

Technical informations

Creation

04/06/2009 09:48:00

First validation

04/06/2009 09:48:00

Update

14/03/2023 15:06:10

Status update

14/03/2023 15:06:10

Last indexation

29/10/2024 11:39:54
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