OCCURRENCE OF ASPERGILLUS-FUMIGATUS IN WEST BERLIN - CONTRIBUTION TO EPIDEMIOLOGY OF ASPERGILLOSIS

Abstract

The increasing incidence of human A. fumigatus infections particularly of the respiratory tract led to this epidemiological study. During Oct. 1968-Dec. 1977, A. fumigatus was isolated from clinical material in 425 cases. These findings which are established at the Mycology Unit, Robert Koch Institute, Federal Health Office, Berlin, West Germany, exhibited the following distribution by regions of the body or type of specimen: respiratory tract 277 (65.1%); venous blood 58 (13.6%); urine 3 (0.7%); stools 9 (2.1%) and others 78 (18.3%). Approximately 2/3 of these findings were made from Oct.-March and about 1/3 between April-Sept. The presence of A. fumigatus in the indoor and outdoor air and in the environment of patients suffering from aspergillosis was studied with the aid of the sedimentation method. This method was chosen because the occurrence of A. fumigatus conidia in the air is of epidemiological interest. The number of isolations of A. fumigatus from outdoor samples was low, so the search for inhalative conidia concentrated upon sites near A. fumigatus habitats. These studies revealed that aspergillosis patients, clinical material sampled from them, decaying plant material (agriculture, horticulture) and used clothes and linen may form foci for the spread of A. fumigatus conidia. The control of aspergillosis in the hospital environment involves in particular control of aspergillosis patients by culture and serology (perferably by the immunodiffussion test). Numerous recommendations are made on how to prevent A. fumigatus infections in hospitals, at the working site and in the laboratory.