Studies on the etiologic mechanism of anisakiasis. --2. Epidemiologic study of inhabitants and questionaire survey in Japan.

A nationwide investigation on the incidence of anisakiasis over a period of 5 years from 1973 through to 1977 was conducted by questionaire sent to 851 main medical centers throughout Japan. The number of cases for all Japanese for a period of 5 years were 334 cases of gastric anisakiasis and 45 intestinal anisakiasis. We investigated both a random group of 3,108 inhabitants of Hokkaido and 42 anisakiasis patients using skin test, indirect hemagglutination test and measurement of serum IgE. We have demonstrated that the etiologic mechanism of acute anisakiasis involved anaphylactic reaction as well as Arthus reaction in the digestive tract.