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Epidemiology of Parasitic Diseases

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The Surgical Management of Parasitic Diseases

Abstract

Parasitic diseases affect the “bottom billion” of the world’s population. These diseases disproportionately affect the poor in developing countries and are responsible for a large disease, social and economic burden. Research and development funding is highly lacking for these illnesses, thus virtually all major surgically relevant parasitic infections are included on the World Health Organization’s list of neglected tropical diseases. These diseases range in severity. Many infections are thought to be asymptomatic, however subtle lifetime effects are often observed due to anaemia, cognitive impairment and fatigue with corresponding reduced lifetime productivity. Some parasitic diseases produce frank and dramatic illness which often requires surgery and some result in the development of malignancies. Various control and eradiation methods have been described for many parasitic illnesses with varying degrees of success. Global attention and funding for these illnesses have increased in recent years however this is dwarfed by the focus of the global medical community on “Western” illnesses in developed countries.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Discipline of Surgery, School of Medicine, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia

    Andrew Phillip Maurice

  2. Department of Surgery, The Townsville Hospital, Townsville, QLD, Australia

    Andrew Phillip Maurice, Ashley Jenkin, Amanda Hamilton & Yik-Hong Ho

  3. Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital, Herston, QLD, Australia

    Andrew Phillip Maurice

  4. Discipline of Surgery, School of Medicine, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD, Australia

    Ashley Jenkin & Yik-Hong Ho

  5. Discipline of Medicine, School of Medicine, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD, Australia

    Robert Edward Norton

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  5. Yik-Hong Ho
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Correspondence to Andrew Phillip Maurice .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Surgery, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece

    George Tsoulfas

  2. Department of Surgery, American University of Beirut Medical Centre, Beirut, Lebanon

    Jamal J. Hoballah

  3. Department of Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA

    George C. Velmahos

  4. Department of Surgery, James Cook University, Douglas, Australia

    Yik-Hong Ho

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Maurice, A.P., Jenkin, A., Norton, R.E., Hamilton, A., Ho, YH. (2020). Epidemiology of Parasitic Diseases. In: Tsoulfas, G., Hoballah, J., Velmahos, G., Ho, YH. (eds) The Surgical Management of Parasitic Diseases. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-47948-0_1

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