Case Report: Conjunctival Infestation with Thelazia gulosa: A Novel Agent of Human Thelaziasis in the United States

Abstract

We report a case of thelaziasis in a 26-year-old female, acquired in Oregon. A total of 14 worms were removed from the patient's left eye and were morphologically identified as being <i>Thelazia gulosa</i>. Until now, only two species of <i>Thelazia</i> have been implicated in causing human disease, <i>Thelazia callipaeda</i> in Asia and Europe and occasional reports of <i>Thelazia californiensis</i> from the United States of America. Here, we describe a third, previously unreported parasite of humans, <i>T. gulosa</i> (the cattle eyeworm) as an agent of human thelaziasis and the first reported case of human thelaziasis in North America in over two decades.