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Risk factors for human leptospirosis following flooding: A meta-analysis of observational studies
- Source :
- PLoS ONE, PLoS ONE, Vol 14, Iss 5, p e0217643 (2019)
- Publication Year :
- 2019
- Publisher :
- Public Library of Science, 2019.
-
Abstract
- Leptospirosis is probably the most widespread zoonotic disease in the world especially in tropical countries. There has been an increase in individual studies, which assessed the frequency of leptospirosis in flood conditions. Some studies showed contact with floods was significantly associated with the occurrence of leptospirosis while other studies reported differently. The objective of this meta-analysis was to synthesize the evidence on the risk factors which are associated with human leptospirosis following flooding. We set up the inclusion criteria and searched for the original studies, addressing leptospirosis in human with related to flood in health-related electronic databases including PubMed, Embase, Ovid Medline, google scholar and Scopus sources. We used the terms 'leptospirosis', 'flood', 'risk factor' and terms from the categories were connected with "OR" within each category and by "AND" between categories. The initial search yielded 557 citations. After the title and abstract screening, 49 full-text papers were reviewed and a final of 18 observational studies met the pre-specified inclusion criteria. Overall, the pooled estimates of 14 studies showed that the contact with flooding was a significant factor for the occurrence of leptospirosis (pooled OR: 2.19, 95%CI: 1.48-3.24, I2:86%). On stratification, the strength of association was greater in the case-control studies (pooled OR: 4.01, 95%CI: 1.26-12.72, I2:82%) than other designs (pooled OR:1.77,95%CI:1.18-2.65, I2:87%). Three factors such as 'being male'(pooled OR:2.06, 95%CI:1.29-2.83), the exposure to livestock animals (pooled OR: 1.95, 95%CI:1.26-2.64), the lacerated wound (pooled OR:4.35, 95%CI:3.07-5.64) were the risk factors significantly associated with the incidence of leptospirosis following flooding in the absence of within-study heterogeneity (I2: 0%). We acknowledge study limitations such as publication bias and type 2 statistical errors. We recommended flood control and other environmental modifications that are expected to reduce the risk of leptospiral infection, and a multi-sectoral effort to this aspect would have long-term benefits.
- Subjects :
- Bacterial Diseases
Epidemiology
Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
Database and Informatics Methods
0302 clinical medicine
Mathematical and Statistical Techniques
Flooding
Risk Factors
Zoonoses
Medicine and Health Sciences
Medicine
030212 general & internal medicine
Database Searching
Leptospira
Mammals
Multidisciplinary
biology
Incidence (epidemiology)
Statistics
Eukaryota
Agriculture
Metaanalysis
Leptospirosis
Bacterial Pathogens
Infectious Diseases
Medical Microbiology
Meta-analysis
Physical Sciences
Vertebrates
Pathogens
Research Article
Neglected Tropical Diseases
Livestock
Science
030231 tropical medicine
MEDLINE
Research and Analysis Methods
Microbiology
Rodents
03 medical and health sciences
Environmental health
Animals
Humans
Risk factor
Statistical Methods
Microbial Pathogens
Bacteria
business.industry
Organisms
Biology and Life Sciences
Publication bias
medicine.disease
biology.organism_classification
Tropical Diseases
Floods
Medical Risk Factors
Amniotes
Earth Sciences
Observational study
Hydrology
business
Mathematics
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 19326203
- Volume :
- 14
- Issue :
- 5
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- PLoS ONE
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....3f7d5d76783547301d374cfbbb39a72b