Sero-detection of Toxoplasma gondii, Rubella virus, Cytomegalovirus and Herpes Simplex virus Antibodies among Pregnant Women in Yastabsheroon Hospital, Khartoum

Abstract

TORCH is a medical acronym for a set of prenatal infections that are passed from pregnant women to their fetuses [Toxoplasma (TO), Rubella virus (R). Cytomegalovirus (C) and Herpes simplex virus I and II (HSV-I and HSV-II)]. The main aim of this study was to investigate the seroprevalence of anti- TORCH IgM antibodeis among pregnant women attending Yastabshiroon Medical Hospital, during the period from March to Augast, 2011. Blood samples were aseptically, collected from pregnant women (n= 75) as test group and non-pregnant women (n= 25) as control group. The age of women tested for antibodies varied from 17 to 55 years with all three trimester of pregnancy. Both immunochromatography test (ICT) and Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) were used to detect anti-TORCH IgM in the serum of all tested women. The results revealed that all women examined were negative for both Toxoplasma gondii and rubella specific IgM antibodies. However, 8 out of 75 (8/75) were CMV IgM positive (10.7%), 4 (4/75) were anti-HSV-I IgM positive (5.3%), and 3 (3/75) were anti-HSV-II IgM positive (4%), All non-pregnant women examined (control group) showed no detectable anti-TORCH antibodies. ELISA was shown to be fairly more sensitive (P < 0.05) in detecting anti-TORCH antibodies in comparison to ICT. There was no significant difference (P > 0.05) observed between trimester of pregnancy on CMV and HSV-I IgM antibodies. While previous abortions had no significant effect (P > 0.05) on detection of all TORCH IgM antibodies, significant effect (P < 0.05) was obtained for anti-CMV antibodies of pregnant women with previous malformed children, but not for HSV-I and HSV-II.