Investigation of Contamination with Ascarid Species by Parasitological and Molecular Techniques in Playgrounds in Parks of Kayseri Province

This study was designed to determine the contamination status of playgrounds with ascarid species of dogs and cats in Kayseri province of Turkey and was carried out on totally 248 sand samples collected from children playgrounds in 20 picnic areas and parks. For this aim sand samples were collected from each park between August-October 2009 and each sampling area was inspected for the presence of dog and/or cat feces. Sand and feces samples were examined by microscopically for the presence of helmint eggs in the laboratory. Genomic DNA's were extracted from samples that were positive for ascarid eggs. PCR was performed on obtained genomic DNA's with primers specific to Toxocara canis, Toxocara cati and Toxascaris leonina. Ten (50.0%) of 20 parks and 33 (13.3%) of 248 sand samples were found to be contaminated with ascarid and some other helmint eggs. Toxocara sp. was found as the most prevalent species with the ratio of 7.3% and this was followed by T leonina (4.0%), Spirocerca lupi (0.8%), Taenia sp.-Echinococcus sp. (0.8%) and Ancylostoma caninum (0.4%). Molecular analysis results revealed that T canis was the most prevalent species with the ratio of 12.0% in the ascarid contaminated sand samples, and this was followed by T leonina (7.5%) and T cati (3.0%). The differences among the prevalence rates of species were found statistically significant (P