Wazir Muhammad, Arshad Khan, Faizur Rehman, Amjad Ali, Shadman Irshad.
Slide positivity rate in clinically suspected malaria cases.
J Med Sci Jan ;18(2):101-3.

Objectives: Malaria continues to be a major public health problem in Pakistan. Microscopy is a cheaper and ideal tool for the diagnosis of malaria. This study was planned to determine the slide positivity rate in clinically suspected cases of malaria. Material and Methods: This five year prospective study was conducted in district Swabi from 1st January 2004 to 31st December 2008. A total of fifty physicians were given a questionnaire to do microscopy during febrile period on patients having a clinical suspicion of malaria and to record results. Results were collected after every four months and then analyzed at the end of the study period. Slide positivity rate (SPR) was calculated by the formula: total positive cases ÷ total slides taken × 100. Results: A total of 95416 slides were examined. Out of the total, 93782 (98%) were negative and 1634 (2%) were positive. Of 1634 positive cases 116 (7.1%) had Plasmodium falciparum (P. faiciparum) infection while 1518 (92.9%) had Plasmodium vivax (P. vivax) infection. Conclusion: Slide positivity rate is very low in clinically suspected cases of malaria. This shows an over diagnosis of Malaria by physician and/or inaddiquate microscopy by pathologist/laboratory technician.

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