ABSTRACT

Cryptosporidium spp. is known to cause heavy diarrhea especially in immunosuppressed patients. In this study, eighty nine leukemia and lymphoma patients between the ages of 1 to 14 were studied for the prevalence of Cryptosporidiosis using both ELISA (Cryptosporidium Rida Screen, R-Biopharm, Germany) and the Kinyoun acid-fast staining method. These patients were sent to us by the Hematology-Oncology department where they were diagnosed with leukemia and lymphoma. Cryptosporidium spp. were detected in 11 patients (12.35%) with ELISA and in 7 patients (7.86%) with the Kinyoun acid fast stain. No cryptosporidiosis was detected in the control groups of 60 patients with neoplasia but without diarrhea. The distribution of Cryptosporidium among positive samples were 7 (14.8%) in patients who were diagnosed with ALL, 3 (10%) in patients who were diagnosed with KML, and 1 (8.3%) in patients who were diagnosed with solid tumors. Sixty-five patients (73.03%) had a fever, 43 patients (48.31%) were vomiting and 58 patients (65.16%) had stomach pain. Except for two, all the patients responded positively to paromomycin treatment. Those two patients responded positively to azitromycine treatment. We suggest that when considering cryptosporidiosis in children with cancer, the use of a more sensitive and specific method such as ELISA- in addition to the acid fast stain should be considered.