Investigation of parasitic agents among cockroaches in Booali hospital, Sari city during 2018

Background: Cockroaches are considered as one of the most important urban pests worldwide.This insect often lives in indoor places including hospitals, hotels, grocery stores, kitchens, bathrooms. Cockroaches are omnivores and therefore play a major role in the mechanical transmission of many pathogens such as bacteria, protozoa, worms, fungi, and viruses to humans.Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigation of parasitic agents among cockroaches in Booali hospital in Sari city.Materials and Methods: The study was conducted in Booali hospital in Sari for one year. In the first step, 300 cockroaches were collected by hand catch and trap methods. After identification, the cockroaches gut were isolated by dissection and examined microscopically. Protozoan agents and worm were identified based on their structural characteristics.Results: All the collected cockroaches identified as Blattella germanica. The dominant parasitic worms among cockroaches in hospitals were Aspiculuris tetraptera, Dentostomella translucida, and oxiuros spp. The isolated protozoa were Gregarina, Entamoeba, Blastocystis, and Nyctotherus. The isolated fungi were Alternaria, Aspergillus, saprophyte fungi, and yeast. Also mites were isolated from collected cockroaches.Conclusion: The obtained results show that cockroaches play an important role in causing nosocomial infections and food poisoning and carry parasitic agents. Using some measures such as sanitation, hospital cleaning, waste collection, sanitary waste disposal, and preventing the storage of food and dry bread waste in hospitals have a direct impact on reducing the number of cockroaches and spreading disease.

کلیدواژه ها:

cockroaches ، parasitic agents ، hospitals