Medical tests for work visa - filariasis

I cannot understand how you're unable to find a testing center for filariasis in the States, or for any other disease, for that matter, especially since there are several ways in which diagnosis could be carried out, such as blood testing and/or x-rays for advanced stages.

You could check out a general practitioner at Washington D.C. and ask for the test. If he isn't equipped for testing, you may ask him to refer you to any tropical medicine center or doctor working within this field.

Some universities in D.C. have tropical medicine centers and professionals, and I believe the University of George Washington has one as well, within their medical school.

Good luck

I cant understand it either, we've talked to a GP, a few major hospital centers (including Georgetown), two major testing companies (Labcorp and Quest Diagnostics). No-one does what the embassy require, which is the (ICT) Imunochromatographic test or Giemsa Stain Thick Film Microscopy. The testing companies only do IGG4 testing which is not what the embassy wants.

Hoping someone has been through this recently and has their test result and can give me the phone number of the place that ran it.

Thanks.

wow, and i thought our embassy testing procedures were difficult.

Good luck with that; hopefully a teacher or two will fill you in on the details, they're just currently unavailable due to vacations and all

To be honest, I really think that those who were asked to provide a negative result for filariasis simply walked into a GPs office and had their papers signed and cleared, without actually undergoing any blood tests (maybe an IGG4 just to clear their conscience).

I can understand your frustration regarding the issue, though, and the embassy shouldn't request such a test in the first place since filariasis is a neglected tropical disease that is only prevalent in specific impoverished areas of South American and African tropical countries.

Furthermore, even if you actually had filariasis, it could not be transmitted here in Kuwait because the only means of transmission is a specific mosquito, which isn't found in Kuwait, nor can it survive here anyway.

In any case, testing for filariasis, especially in Northern states, is difficult because blood tests depend on the type of parasite itself, nocturnal or diurnal (aka testing may have to be done at night, which may not be an option at most labs).

As I mentioned earlier, only university labs of parasitology may have such blood tests. However, you could just try to have a GP sign off on your papers without testing. I bet he'll laugh over the silliness of having to undergo a filariasis test to move to Kuwait.

That embassy health form should definitely change.