| Summary: | <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Rapid diagnosis and correct treatment of cases are the main objectives of control programs in malaria-endemic areas.</p> <p>Methods and results</p> <p>To evaluate these criteria and in a comparative study, blood specimens were collected from 120 volunteers seeking care at the Malaria Health Center in Chahbahar district. One hundred and seven out of 120 Giemsa-stained slides were positive for malaria parasites by microscopy. Eighty-four (70%) and 20 (16.7%) were identified as having only <it>Plasmodium vivax</it> and <it>Plasmodium falciparum</it> infections, respectively, while only 3 (2.5%) were interpreted as having mixed <it>P. vivax-P. falciparum</it> infections.</p> <p>The target DNA sequence of the 18S small sub-unit ribosomal RNA (ssrRNA) gene was amplified by Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) and used for the diagnosis of malaria in south-eastern Iran. One hundred twenty blood samples were submitted and the results were compared to those of routine microscopy. The sensitivity of PCR for detection of <it>P. vivax</it> and <it>P. falciparum</it> malaria was higher than that of microscopy: nested PCR detected 31 more mixed infections than microscopy and parasite positive reactions in 9 out of the 13 microscopically negative samples. The results also confirmed the presence of <it>P. vivax</it> and <it>P. falciparum.</it></p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>These results suggest that, in places where transmission of both <it>P. vivax</it> and <it>P. falciparum</it> occurs, nested PCR detection of malaria parasites can be a very useful complement to microscopical diagnosis.</p>
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