Johns Hopkins ABX Guide
Taenia solium
MICROBIOLOGY
- Taenia solium (pork tapeworm) and Taenia saginata (beef tapeworm) are intestinal cestodes.
- Cysticercosis including neurocysticercosis is the main concern of these tapeworm infections, caused by Taenia solium.
- Life cycle: additional details in CDC illustration.
- Eggs or gravid proglottids are passed in the stool.
- Pigs ingest contaminated vegetation, and oncospheres hatch in the intestine.
- Organisms invade the intestinal wall, migrate to striated muscles, and develop into cysticerci.
- Humans ingest raw or undercooked infected meat, and gastric juices activate larvae, leading to evagination of scolex and attachment to the small intestine.
- Over 2-4 months, cysticercus develops into an adult tapeworm; may grow up to 7 meters in length.
- Adults have up to 1,000 proglottids, each containing 50,000-100,000 eggs.
- Pigs are intermediate hosts; humans acquire intestinal tapeworm by eating undercooked pork containing cysticerci.
- Humans acquire disseminated cysticercosis by ingesting eggs in food/water contaminated by human tapeworm carriers.
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Last updated: August 8, 2022
Citation
Auwaerter, Paul G, and Trevor A Crowell. "Taenia Solium." Johns Hopkins ABX Guide, The Johns Hopkins University, 2022. Pediatrics Central, peds.unboundmedicine.com/pedscentral/view/Johns_Hopkins_ABX_Guide/540151/all/Taenia_solium.
Auwaerter PG, Crowell TA. Taenia solium. Johns Hopkins ABX Guide. The Johns Hopkins University; 2022. https://peds.unboundmedicine.com/pedscentral/view/Johns_Hopkins_ABX_Guide/540151/all/Taenia_solium. Accessed November 21, 2024.
Auwaerter, P. G., & Crowell, T. A. (2022). Taenia solium. In Johns Hopkins ABX Guide. The Johns Hopkins University. https://peds.unboundmedicine.com/pedscentral/view/Johns_Hopkins_ABX_Guide/540151/all/Taenia_solium
Auwaerter PG, Crowell TA. Taenia Solium [Internet]. In: Johns Hopkins ABX Guide. The Johns Hopkins University; 2022. [cited 2024 November 21]. Available from: https://peds.unboundmedicine.com/pedscentral/view/Johns_Hopkins_ABX_Guide/540151/all/Taenia_solium.
* Article titles in AMA citation format should be in sentence-case
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PB - The Johns Hopkins University
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