Epidemiologic features of domestically contracted shigellosis in a Tokyo Metropolitan Hospital

Abstract

Sixty-nine Japanese patients infected with shigellosis domestically were admitted to a hospital in eastern Tokyo from January 1988 to December 1995. According to a review of their charts 92% of these patients lived in Tokyo, and 88% contracted the disease in Tokyo. Sixty-eight percent and 29% of them were infected withShigella sonnei and S.flexneri, respectively. Of the twenty outbreaks identified, the majority occurred in homes, with as many as 50% of the patients under 10 years old infected withS. sonnei associated with the outbreaks in homes. It took a mean of 2.5 days to make a correct diagnosis for the symptomatic patients who initially contacted our hospital, in contrast to a mean of 5.6 days for those who initially visited other hospitals. Our results indicate that domestic shigellosis is a significant medical problem in Tokyo.