Sketchy Micro: Trypanosoma Brucei

Question 1

What illness does Trypanosoma cause?

Answer 1

Sleeping sickness (like Sleeping Beauty in this scene)

Question 2

_____________ carries Trypanosoma.

Answer 2

Tsetse flies (like the flies in the TEA by her bead)

Question 3

Trypanosoma brucei is native to ______________.

Answer 3

southern and western Africa (like the map with Rhodesia and Gambia pinned)

Question 4

What are the symptoms of sleeping sickness?

Answer 4

• Coma (like Sleeping Beauty)
• Cervical and axillary lymphadenopathy (like her pearl necklace and ruffled sleeves)
• Recurrent fever (like the undulating hills in the background and her red cheeks)

Question 5

How can T. brucei be diagnosed?

Answer 5

Trypomastigotes will be found in blood smears (like the blood drops on her finger next to the stuffed goat)

Question 6

People generally don’t become immune to Trypanosoma because _______________.

Answer 6

it can undergo antigenic variation (like the multicolored tents outside)

Question 7

Trypanosoma have only one ______________.

Answer 7

flagella (like the single pink ribbon in Sleeping Beauty’s hair)

Question 8

How can T. brucei be treated?

Answer 8

• Melarsoprol (the Mela Soap bar carried by Prince Bruce)

* Suramin (like the life-saving SeRuM brought by Prince Bruce)

Question 9

Which treatment kills Trypanosoma in the CNS?

Answer 9

Melarsoprol

“Suramin for the Serum.”