[The first case of tsutsugamushi disease in Ehime Prefecture]

The first case of tsutsugamushi disease in Ehime Prefecture was experienced in December 1987 with successful isolation of the causative agent. The patient was taken ill twelve days after infection. Immunofluorescent antibody tests using the isolate, Yamazaki strain, and Gilliam, Karp, Kato, Irie and Shimokoshi strains as antigens revealed that the specific antibodies against these antigens appeared and increased in the blood of the patient during the course of the disease. And the antibody titers to the Yamazaki antigen were the highest of these antigens. Agglutinin for Proteus OXK did not appear in the blood of the patient. The immunofluorescent antibody test using type-specific monoclonal antibodies to Gilliam, Karp, Kato, Irie and Shimokoshi strains and these five strains and the Yamazaki strain as antigens revealed that the Yamazaki strain was identified as Karp type of Rickettsia tsutsugamushi.