Helminths and malaria co-infections are associated with elevated serum IgE

Background: both helminth and malaria infections result in a highly polarized immune response characterized by ige production. this study aimed to investigate the total serum ige profile in vivo as a measure of th2 immune response in malaria patients with and without helminth co-infection. methods. a cross sectional observational study composed of microscopically confirmed malaria positive (n = 197) and malaria negative (n = 216) apparently healthy controls with and without helminth infection was conducted at wondo genet health center,southern ethiopia. a pre-designed structured format was utilized to collect socio-demographic and clinical data of the subjects. detection and quantification of helminths,malaria parasites and determination of serum ige levels were carried out following standard procedures. results: irrespective of helminth infection,individuals infected by malaria showed significantly high levels of serum ige compared with malaria free apparently healthy controls (with and without helminth infections). moreover,malaria patients co-infected with intestinal helminths showed high level of serum ige compared with those malaria patients without intestinal helminths (2198 iu/ml versus 1668 iu/ml). a strong statistically significant association was observed between malaria parasite density and elevated serum ige levels (2047 iu/ml versus 1778 iu/ml; p = 0.001) with high and low parasitaemia (parasite density >50,000 parasite/μl of blood),respectively. likewise,helminth egg loads were significantly associated with elevated serum ige levels (p = 0.003). conclusions: the elevated serum ige response in malaria patients irrespective of helminth infection and its correlation with malaria parasite density and helminth egg intensity support that malaria infection is also a strong driver of ige production as compared to helminths. © 2014mulu et al.; licensee biomed central ltd.