prevalence of intestinal parasites in hiv-positive patients attending ahvaz health centers in 2012: a cross-sectional study in south of iran

Background: aids is now known as a crisis throughout the world. gastrointestinal parasites are the main causes of infections in hiv-positive patients. objectives: this study aimed to investigate the prevalence of intestinal parasites in hiv-positive patients who referred to ahvaz health centers, ahvaz, iran in 2012. patients and methods: this cross-sectional study was conducted on 200 hiv-positive patients of the ahvaz health centers who selected by convenient sampling. patients’ demographics were recorded by a researcher-made questionnaire. then, their fecal samples were collected and tested by using direct and concentrated formalin-ether and modified acid-fast staining. data were analyzed by spss 19 software using chi-square and anova (analysis of variance) tests. results: the prevalence of intestinal parasites was 48.8%, which shows a high prevalence in hiv-positive patients. there was a significant relationship between prevalence of parasite and variables of job, kind of health centers, history of diarrhea (p = 0.0001), education (p = 0.001), and age (p = 0.005), but there was no relationship with variables of cd4+ count (p = 0.293) and dyspepsia (p = 0.103). conclusions: given the prevalence of most gastrointestinal parasites, the hiv-positive patients show a weak immune system and higher sensitivity for infection particularly for opportunistic parasites. so, routine stool tests for detection of intestinal parasites are very useful for people with weakened immune systems.