MIS-C and Visceral Leishmaniasis Co-occurence: Has the Clinic of Other Diseases Masked in the Pandemia?

Abstract

At the end of 2019, the newly detected severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronavirus (COVID)-2 in China spread rapidly and caused a global epidemic. It has been observed that the virus, which is the cause of COVID-2019 and can cause severe acute respiratory failure, later causes a hyperinflammatory picture and causes a clinical picture similar to Kawasaki disease. Fever, cardiac involvement and rash are the most common findings in this picture, which is called multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C). Although its pathophysiology is not fully known yet, the most common cause is thought to be post-infection immune dysregulation. Visceral leishmaniasis (VL) is a zoonosis in which Leishmania infantum and rarely Leishmania donovani are the agents and can cause a similar clinical picture. In this text; we discussed a patient who was followed up with a diagnosis of COVID-associated MIS-C, but without an adequate response in his clinic with MIS-C treatment, and was diagnosed with VL with further examinations. To our knowledge, this is the first MIS-C and VL co-occurence in the literature.