Estimating trematode prevalence in snail hosts using a single-step duplex PCR: how badly does cercarial shedding underestimate infection rates?

ABSTRACT:

Background

Trematode communities often consist of different species exploiting the same host population, with two or more trematodes sometimes co-occuring in the same host. A commonly used diagnostic method to detect larval trematode infections in snails has been based on cercarial shedding, though it is often criticized as inaccurate. In the present study we compare infection prevalences determined by cercarial emission with those determined, for the first time, by molecular methods, allowing us to quantify the underestimation of single and double infections based on cercarial emission. We thus developed a duplex PCR for two host-parasite systems, to specifically differentiate between single and double infections. The Ebro samples include two morphologically similar opecoelids, wh

SUBMITTER: Born-Torrijos A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4068961 | biostudies-literature | 2014 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature