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ABSTRACT
This study was conducted between April and June, 2017 to investigate the prevalence of gastrointestinal parasites among children at the Internally Displaced Person’s Camp (IDP) in Uhogua, Ovia North-East Local Government Area of Edo State, Nigeria. Two hundred and forty-nine children were examined for the study and Structured questionnaire were administered to obtain Anthropometric data. Direct Smear technique was used in the analysis of the stool samples and an overall prevalence of 223(89.56%) was obtained. A total of 8 species of intestinal parasites were recorded in this study. The protozoans had the highest prevalence of 182(73.09%), the parasites reported in this study included Entamoeba histolytica, Gardia lambia, Entamoeba coli and Cystoisospora belli. In the species specific prevalence of protozoan parasites, E. histolytica recorded the highest prevalence of 160(64.26%), followed by G. lambia with 142(57.03%), E. coli with 103(41.37%) and C. belli with 3(1.2%). The helminthes recorded a prevalence of 175(70.28%), those reported in this study included Strongyloides stercoralis, Ascaris lumbricoides, Hookworm and Trichuris trichiura. In species specific prevalence of Helminthes, S. stercoralis was reported in 85 children representing 34.14% of the study population, followed by A. lumbricoides with 79(31.73%) and Hookworm with 70(28.11%). While the least prevalence of 44(17.67%) was recorded in T. trichuira. Among the children examined in this study, 21 were between the ages of 6-10 years and 196 were between 11-15 years. In the age-specific prevalence of Intestinal parasites (Protozoan and Helminthes), the 6-10 years’ age group had the highest prevalence of 21(100%), followed by the 11-15 years’ age group with 187(95.41%). This study comprised of 115 females and 134 males. Sex-specific prevalence of protozoan parasite was higher in females 112(99.11%) than males 111(97.39%) and there was no significant association between sex and parasites (p>0.05). In children between 6-10 years of age, all those underweight and overweight that were examined were infected with one parasite or the other. While no parasite was reported in children that were Obese. In contrast to the lower age group, the highest prevalence reported in children between the ages 11-15 was among those that were Obese. While the least prevalence of 3(60.0%) was reported in those children that were underweight. There was no significant association between the BMI and prevalence rate (p>0.05). The results obtained from this study suggest the need for mass public health education on personal hygiene practices in the community and the camp, continuous large scale de-worming campaigns in all primary schools and secondary schools in the area and this can be extended to the surrounding communities. The children should be taught regular hands washing because they easily get contaminated in daily life and the pathogens are easily transferred to their mouths or food.
