Congenital Rubella Syndrome in Iran

Overview

Journal BMC Infect Dis

Publisher Biomed Central

Specialty Infectious Diseases

Date 2005 Jun 9

PMID 15938744

Citations 4

Authors

Jila Sadighi

Hasan Eftekhar

Kazem Mohammad

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Background: Congenital rubella syndrome (CRS) can be prevented with appropriate vaccination programs. The prevalence rates of rubella and CRS in Iran are unknown; therefore, the risk of exposure in pregnant women is not clear. The prevalence of CRS in the pre-vaccine period can be estimated by evaluating the proportion of children in the population with sensorineural hearing loss attributable to rubella.

Methods: This was a case-control study to estimate prevalence of CRS in Tehran (Iran) by evaluating the proportion of children with sensorineural hearing loss attributable to rubella. The study used rubella antibody titer as an indicator, and compared the prevalence of rubella antibody between children with and without sensorineural hearing loss. Using these findings, the proportion of cases of sensorineural hearing loss attributable to rubella was estimated.

Results: A total of 225 children aged 1 to 4 years were entered into the study (113 cases and 112 controls). There was a significant difference between cases and controls with regard to rubella antibody seropositivity (19.5% vs. 8.9%, respectively, odds ratio = 2.47, 95% CI = 1.04-5.97). The proportion of sensorineural hearing loss cases attributable to rubella was found to be 12%, corresponding to a CRS prevalence of 0.2/1000.

Conclusion: The prevalence of CRS was approximately 0.2/1000 before rubella vaccination in Iran, Moreover; the results suggest that implementation of appropriate rubella vaccination programs could potentially prevent about 12% of cases of sensorineural hearing loss in Iranian children. This data could potentially be used as baseline data, which in conjunction with an appropriate method, to establish a surveillance system for rubella vaccination in Iran. An appropriate surveillance system is needed, because the introduction of a rubella vaccine without epidemiological data and an adequate monitoring program could result in the shifting of rubella cases to higher ages, and increasing the incidence of CRS.

Citing Articles

A Review on Rubella Vaccine: Iran (1975-2010).

Shafayi A, Mohammadi A Arch Razi Inst. 2021; 76(2):167-192.

PMID: 34223717 PMC: 8410184. DOI: 10.22092/ari.2021.353242.1594.

Measles and rubella serosusceptibity among population vaccinated with different schedules: the potential impact on measles-rubella elimination in Iran.

Saffar H, Khalifeloo M, Saffar M, Abdollahi A, Parsaei M, Ghorbani G BMC Infect Dis. 2021; 21(1):305.

PMID: 33765968 PMC: 7995582. DOI: 10.1186/s12879-021-05970-7.

Seroprevalence of antibodies to measles and rubella eight months after a vaccination campaign in the southeast of Iran.

Izadi S, Zahraei S, Mokhtari-Azad T Hum Vaccin Immunother. 2018; 14(6):1412-1416.

PMID: 29420120 PMC: 6037465. DOI: 10.1080/21645515.2018.1436920.

Seroprevalence of anti-rubella and anti-measles IgG antibodies in pregnant women in Shiraz, Southern Iran: outcomes of a nationwide measles-rubella mass vaccination campaign.

Honarvar B, Moghadami M, Moattari A, Emami A, Odoomi N, Bagheri Lankarani K PLoS One. 2013; 8(1):e55043.

PMID: 23383049 PMC: 3561451. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0055043.

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