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Volume 22, Number 5—May 2016
Letter

Congenital Trypanosomiasis in Child Born in France to African Mother

Marie-Alix Lestrade-Carluer De Kyvon, Zoha Maakaroun-Vermesse, Philippe Lanotte, Gerardo Priotto, Pere Perez-Simarro, Anne-Marie Guennoc, Bertrand De Toffol, Luc Paris, Louis Bernard, Alain Goudeau, Jacques Chandenier, and Guillaume DesoubeauxComments to Author 
Author affiliations: Centre Hospitalier Régional Universitaire de Tours, Tours, France (M.-A. Lestrade-Carluer De Kyvon, Z. Maakaroun-Vermesse, P. Lanotte, A.-M. Guennoc, B. De Toffol, L. Bernard, A. Goudeau, J. Chandenier, G. Desoubeaux); Université François-Rabelais, Tours (P. Lanotte, L. Bernard, A. Goudeau, J. Chandenier, G. Desoubeaux); World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland (G. Priotto, P. Perez-Simarro); Hôpitaux Universitaires La Pitié Salpêtrière–Charles Foix, Paris, France (L. Paris)

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Figure

A) Cytological slide prepared from cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) from a child with congenital trypanosomiasis who was born in France to an African mother (Gram staining, original magnification ×1,000). B) Blood smear from the child (May-Grunewald Giemsa [MGG] staining, original magnification ×1,000). C) Mott cell in the mother’s CSF (MGG staining, original magnification ×1,000). Trypomastigote forms of Trypanosoma brucei are extracellular structures, 2 × 25 μm, with a terminal flagellum (gray arrow,

Figure. A) Cytological slide prepared from cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) from a child with congenital trypanosomiasis who was born in France to an African mother (Gram staining, original magnification ×1,000). B) Blood smear from the child (May-Grunewald Giemsa [MGG] staining, original magnification ×1,000). C) Mott cell in the mother’s CSF (MGG staining, original magnification ×1,000). Trypomastigote forms of Trypanosoma brucei are extracellular structures, 2 × 25 μm, with a terminal flagellum (gray arrow, panel A), which is prolonged by an undulating membrane (black arrow, panel A). A central nucleus, which was difficult to visualize by Gram staining, shows that the microorganism is eukaryote. The kinetoplast (arrow, panel B) is more visible by MGG staining. It is a small organelle at the end of the cell that permits the synchronous movement of the flagellum and the undulating membrane. The kinetoplast contains circular mitochondrial DNA (1). The numerous mononuclear cells in CSF and blood are activated lymphocytes. The Mott cell (arrow, panel C) is a plasma cell that has spherical inclusions packed into its cytoplasm. It is often found in human trypanosomiasis (3). Diagnosis was subsequently confirmed by PCR.

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