Int.J.Curr.Microbiol.App.Sci (2016) 5(3): 738-744 738 Original Research Article http://dx.doi.org/10.20546/ijcmas.2016.503.086 Prevalence of G6PD Deficiency among the Malaria Patients in Urban Kolkata, India - A Clinic Based Study Moytrey Chatterjee 1 , Swagata Ganguly 1,2 , Pabitra Saha 1,3 *, Dilip K. Bera 5 , Nandita Basu 4 and Ardhendu K. Maji 1 1 Protozoology Unit, Department of Microbiology, Calcutta School of Tropical Medicine, 108, C. R. Avenue, Kolkata 700 073, India 2 Department of Microbiology, NRS Medical College, 138 AJC Bose Road, Kolkata 700 014, India 3 Department of Zoology, A. P. C. Roy Govt. College, Himachal Bihar, Matigara, Siliguri- 734 010, West Bengal, India 4 Director, Calcutta School of Tropical Medicine, 108, C. R. Avenue, Kolkata 700 073, India 5 Department of Microbiology, Calcutta School of Tropical Medicine, 108, C. R. Avenue, Kolkata 700 073, India *Corresponding author ABSTRACT Introduction The glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficiency is an erythro- enzymopathological disease in humans, affecting 400 million people worldwide (Howes et al., 2012; Isaac et al., 2013). It is an X-linked recessive, heritable, genetic disorder, due to mutations in the G6PD gene, which cause functional variants with many biochemical and clinical phenotypes. The G6PD gene is situated at the telomeric region of the X chromosome (band Xq28) which consists of 13 exons and 12 introns. It International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences ISSN: 2319-7706 Volume 5 Number 3(2016) pp. 738-744 Journal homepage: http://www.ijcmas.com The estimation of G6PD deficiency (G6PDd) is an important aspect in the current situation of malaria elimination which requires use of primaquine to prevent transmission of P. falciparum and relapse of P. vivax. Long term use of primaquine can induce acute hemolytic anemia in G6PD deficient cases. A very little information is available about the prevalence of G6PDd among the malaria positive cases from India. The present study was designed to evaluate the G6PDd among the malaria positive patients attending the Calcutta School of Tropical Medicine. A total of 583 blood samples were collected from diagnosed malaria cases. G6PDd was estimated by Dichloro-phenol-indophenol (DCIP) decolorizing test. The mean age of recruited patients was 28.6 years ranging from 4-70 years. Out of 583 patients tested, 8 (1.37%) were found to be G6PD deficient. G6PDd was more prevalent in P. vivax infected patients (2.3%) than the P. falciparum (0.4%) (P-value = 0.0401). G6PD deficiency was more prevalent in females (2.06%) than in males (1.23%). The prevalence of G6PDd among the study population is low, but before the long term treatment of primaquine, G6PD deficiency test should be performed to avoid deaths due to primaquine induced acute hemolytic anemia. Keywords G6PD deficiency, Malaria, P. falciparum, P. vivax, India. Accepted: 20 February 2016 Available Online: 10 March 2016 Article Info