Eastern Journal of Medicine, cilt.23, sa.4, ss.232-236, 2018 (Scopus)
The aim of this study is to determine the most frequent opportunistic intestinal parasites in children and demonstrate its importance. Study was conducted on patients between the ages 0 and 16. The study consisted of a total of 150 children, 66 girls and 84 boys. 44 of the girls and 56 of the boys (100 in total) had diarrhea. Evaluation was done by native-Lugol, flotation in saturated zinc sulfate, and modified acid-fast staining. Intestinal parasites were detected in 38% of 150 examined stool samples. Among them 41% of those with diarrhea and 32% of those without diarrhea were positive. The highest observed parasite species was detected as Blastocystis hominis (14.7%); and the lowest were Ascaris lumbricoides and Hymenolepis nana (0.7%). It was concluded that all children with gastro-intestinal complaints should be evaluated for intestinal parasites, mainly opportunistic ones, without preliminary screening whether the patient is diarrhea or not.