Infectious Disease Compendium

Ancylostoma duodenale

Microbiology

Human hookworm.

Epidemiologic Risks

Walking barefoot in human stool, more common than one might suspect. If goes from the skin to the blood to the lung where it is coughed up and swallowed and from there to the small bowel where it sets up shop, drinking your blood and laying eggs.  What a wild life-cycle.

Ancylostoma ceylanicum is not uncommon in SE Asia, from dogs and cats (PubMed).

Syndromes

Causes iron deficiency anemia, primarily in the US SE and the tropics and subtropics (45 degrees north, 30 degrees south); also ground itch when you walk barefoot in the larva.

Treatment

Mebendazole 100 mg tid for 3 days OR pyrantel pamoate 11 mg/kg (to a max of 1 g) q d x 3 OR thiabendazole 400 mg x 1.

Notes

1 billion people are likley infected. The females can lay 10,000 to 30,000 eggs a day.

Last update: 12/27/19