Serological Study of Brucellosis in Cases of Pyrexia of Unknown Origin (PUO) in Rural Population Around Karimnagar, Andhra Pradesh

Brucellosis is one of the world's major zoonosis. It is an infectious disease of public health importance and economic concern in many parts of the world. In this area of Andhra Pradesh, a large population is dependent on agriculture and people frequently come in contact with infected animals (goats, sheep, cattle, and other animals) and their products. They suffer from brucellosis like manifestation clinically. So we have taken this study to know the seroprevalence of brucellosis in patients from rural areas who presented with PUO. This study was designed to study the prevalence of brucellosis in cases of pyrexia of unknown origin admitted at Prathima Institute of Medical Sciences, Karimnagar from the neighbouring rural population and its correlation with demographic profile of study population. During the period from October 2011 to July 2013, 792 sera received from rural patients with pyrexia of unknown origin (PUO) were tested by Rose Bengal Plate Agglutination Test (RBPT). Seroprevalence of Brucellosis was found out to be 1.14% among the rural population presenting with PUO. Our study found that, RBPT could be employed as an efficient screening test for brucellosis. A substantial proportion of sera received for various serological investigations like Widal and RA factor were positive for Brucella agglutinins, suggesting a need to investigate all sera for Brucella agglutinins.