CRIBADO PARA CHAGAS EN UNIVERSITARIOS DE LA FACULTAD DE CIENCIAS QUÍMICO FARMACÉUTICAS Y BIOQUÍMICAS QUE REALIZARON SERVICIO SOCIAL RURAL

Abstract

Chagas disease is endemic in Bolivia and prevalent in Chuquisaca. Since most students of the Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Biochemistry courses perform rural social service, the Chagas Disease Research and Diagnosis Center (CIDECH) considered performing the Chagas Screening in university students of the Faculty of Chemical Pharmaceutical and Biochemical Sciences of the USFXCH, who performed rural social service between 2020 and 2024. A laboratory analysis of 730 samples was carried out using indirect hemagglutination as a screening test and the 3rd generation recombinant ELISA technique as a confirmatory test, 25 reactive samples were detected with the presence of anti-Trypanosoma cruzi antibodies, obtaining a prevalence of 3.4%. Of the university students with reactive screening, 80% are female and 20% male, with an age range between 22 and 59 years, where the highest percentage of reactivity was found between 30 and 33 years; 52% belong to the Biochemistry Degree and 48% to the Pharmaceutical Chemistry Degree, it was evident that 12% of reactive students received a blood transfusion and a slight increase in reactive cases from 2021.