Monday, July 23, 2012

Case of the Week 217

The following material was submitted to the laboratory for identification of possible parasites.  No history was provided.



Under the dissecting microscope, the following were seen:

(low power)

(higher power)


Our clinical microbiology fellow skillfully dissected a few of these arthropods out of the "fuzz" and mounted them on a slide.  Here is a representative specimen.  He also called the ordering physician to



Identification? 
How would you sign this case out?  (Is this a human parasite?)

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Some sort of mite

Anonymous said...

Its a mite...Is there a way you can differentiate a dust mite from the
s.scabies?

Anonymous said...

Too big for dust mite - and not a scabies mite... may be Ornithonyssus bacoti(which is of relevance for human infection)? Or may be Ornithonyssus sylviarum??

Or perhaps Liponyssides sanguineus - which vectors rikettsial pox - but I am not really sure of what that mite looks like...

Anonymous said...

It's a mite, totally innoscent in my oppinion

Anonymous said...

dust mite

Anonymous said...

Mite.Where was specimen collected from? Any bites found on humans?Rodent and bird mites do bite humans.

Anonymous said...

Mites. Dermatophagoides sp.
Florida fan

ParasiteGal said...

Thanks to everyone for leaving the comments! Dust mites are a good consideration, but the mites shown here are much too large to be dust mites (not easily visible with a dissecting microscope) and have very distinctive pointed appendages. I'll do my best to show you some in a future case. Stay tuned!

Anonymous said...

I thought I saw 8 legs for a second which made me think is was an odd spider for a second, then i was thinkin "spider mite". I don't know if it's the right size, but here's a picture of a red spider mite that looks very similar.

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/upload.php

I odn't know if the ones in your picture are albino or if I'm just completely wrong. It would be nice to find out though.

ParasiteGal said...

The final identification for all of the entomologists out there was Ornithonyssus sylviarum, the Northern Fowl Mite. Thank you for all of your comments!