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Case #255 - July, 2009

A 36-year-old man was admitted to the hospital with fever, chills, headache, and myalgia. The patient recently returned to the United States following a month-long trip to Rwanda to visit family. Blood was collected in EDTA and sent to the Hematology Department for work-up. Figures A-F show what was observed on a thin smear made from the blood, stained with Giemsa. All images were captured at 1000x magnification. What is your diagnosis? Based on what criteria?

Case255_A

Figure A

Case255_B

Figure B

Case255_C

Figure C

Case255_D

Figure D

Case255_E

Figure E

Case255_F

Figure F

Case Answer

This was a case of malaria caused by Plasmodium ovale. Diagnostic features included:

  • infected RBCs showing slight enlargement.
  • infected RBCs with trophozoites exhibiting elongation, fimbriation and Schüffner's stippling (Figures A, B, E, and F).
  • infected RBCs with macrogametocytes that fill the host RBC and exhibit coarse pigment, compact chromatin, and Schüffner's stippling (Figures C and D).

More on: Malaria

Images presented in the monthly case studies are from specimens submitted for diagnosis or archiving. On rare occasions, clinical histories given may be partly fictitious.

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DPDx is an education resource designed for health professionals and laboratory scientists. For an overview including prevention and control visit www.cdc.gov/parasites/.

  • Page last reviewed: August 24, 2016
  • Page last updated: August 24, 2016
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