Abstract
In 1903, Leishman and Donovan separately described the protozoan now called Leishmania donovani in splenic tissue from patients in India with the life-threatening disease now called visceral leishmaniasis. Almost a century later, many features of leishmaniasis and its major syndromes (ie, visceral, cutaneous, and mucosal) have remained the same; but also much has changed. As before, epidemics of this sandfly-borne disease occur periodically in India and elsewhere; but leishmaniasis has also emerged in new regions and settings, for example, as an AIDS-associated opportunistic infection. Diagnosis still typically relies on classic microbiological methods, but molecular-based approaches are being tested. Pentavalent antimony compounds have been the mainstay of antileishmanial therapy for half a century, but lipid formulations of amphotericin B (though expensive and administered parenterally) represent a major advance for treating visceral leishmaniasis. A pressing need is for the technological advances in the understanding of the immune response to leishmania and the pathogenesis of leishmaniasis to be translated into field-applicable and affordable methods for diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of this disease.
TY - JOUR
T1 - Leishmaniasis.
A1 - Herwaldt,B L,
PY - 1999/10/8/pubmed
PY - 1999/10/8/medline
PY - 1999/10/8/entrez
KW - Diseases
KW - Examinations And Diagnoses
KW - Laboratory Examinations And Diagnoses
KW - Leishmaniasis
KW - Parasitic Diseases
KW - Signs And Symptoms
KW - Treatment
KW - World
SP - 1191
EP - 9
JF - Lancet (London, England)
JO - Lancet
VL - 354
IS - 9185
N2 - In 1903, Leishman and Donovan separately described the protozoan now called Leishmania donovani in splenic tissue from patients in India with the life-threatening disease now called visceral leishmaniasis. Almost a century later, many features of leishmaniasis and its major syndromes (ie, visceral, cutaneous, and mucosal) have remained the same; but also much has changed. As before, epidemics of this sandfly-borne disease occur periodically in India and elsewhere; but leishmaniasis has also emerged in new regions and settings, for example, as an AIDS-associated opportunistic infection. Diagnosis still typically relies on classic microbiological methods, but molecular-based approaches are being tested. Pentavalent antimony compounds have been the mainstay of antileishmanial therapy for half a century, but lipid formulations of amphotericin B (though expensive and administered parenterally) represent a major advance for treating visceral leishmaniasis. A pressing need is for the technological advances in the understanding of the immune response to leishmania and the pathogenesis of leishmaniasis to be translated into field-applicable and affordable methods for diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of this disease.
SN - 0140-6736
UR - https://www.unboundmedicine.com/medline/citation/10513726/Leishmaniasis_
L2 - https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0140-6736(98)10178-2
DB - PRIME
DP - Unbound Medicine
ER -