[Imported dengue in france (1989-1993). Conditions to be met for assuring an accurate etiological diagnosis]

Every year, many travellers are going in endemic zone of dengue for more or less long stay. Back home, they show sometimes a feverish and algic syndrome reminding the dengue, and the confirmation of the diagnosis is required at the laboratory. In most cases, the impossibility to proceed to the isolation of the virus, the relative lack of specificity and the cross-reactions, that the available serological techniques do not allow to avoid, make delicate even impossible the interpretation of the results. A five-year assessment has nevertheless been attempted: it allows to establish that probably about several tens of dengue cases are imported each year in France. The conditions allowing to confirm biologically the clinical diagnosis are recalled and strict interpretation criteria are proposed.