Amebic Pericarditis: Causes, Symptoms, Diagnosis & Treatment
Amebic Pericarditis
Amebiasis, transmitted by the protozoan Entamoeba histolytica, is considered initially and predominantly an intestinal disease, but it involves the liver in a substantial proportion of patients. The infective encysted form of the parasite, communicated person to person without an intermediate host and usually by water or food contaminated by human fecal material, enters the intestinal tract by the mouth, passes through the stomach, and loses its cystic wall in the small intestine. There the cyst, 5 to 20 µ in diameter, having matured during its passage, releases from one to four trophozoites (vegetative form), which in contrast to the cyst, are mobile but do not survive outside the host’s body. The amebas, which have attached themselves to the colonic wall, migrate into the crypts and penetrate the epithelium and muscularis. From the submucosa, the amebas move along to other organs, particularly the liver, creating there the chronic nonsuppurative form of amebic hepatitis or producing abscesses. Other trophozoites are excreted in the encysted form, thus maintaining the life cycle.









