Abstract

CORRALES-AGUILAR, Eugenia  and  HUN-OPFER, Laya. New Perspectives on Dengue Pathogenesis. Acta méd. costarric [online]. 2012, vol.54, n.2, pp.75-85. ISSN 0001-6002.

Dengue viral infections represent a major concern for public health. Yet, the mechanisms of dengue virus (DENV) pathogenesis are not understood very well yet, since there are no suitable animal models for studying the course of disease. The only source of knowledge is limited to clinical studies involving patients, which vary a lot and do not allow for the accurate understanding of the pathological events that occur during viral infection. Nevertheless, several factors seem to be related to DENV pathogenesis: i) viral factors, such as virulence and virus transmissibility and ii) host determinants like the immune response, immune status and genetic characteristics. In this review we describe the factors that play an important role in dengue pathogenesis in order to have a better understanding of the disease and to allow for a more suitable therapeutic management of patients. Since the current disease classification used for determining risk factors during the course of a dengue infection is no longer congruent with the clinical studies performed, the use of the new dengue disease classification dictated by the World Health Organization (WHO) is suggested.

Keywords : dengue; virus; pathogenesis; severe dengue.

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