Malaria mixta: prevalencia en Colombia y América Latina

background: mixed plasmodial infection (mxpi) and mixed malaria (mxm) are poorly understood. objective: to review information about mxpi/mxm and to collect and organize colombian and latin american data. methods: systematic review on mxip/mxm; the terms 'mixed malaria' or 'malaria mixta' were used for a search in pubmed and lilacs. results and conclusions: information retrieved was scarce, disperse and difficult to find. mxpi/mxm is underestimated by microscopy (thick blood smear). a second plasmodial species is often detected after successful treatment for infection with another. epidemiological behavior of mxpi/mxm is variable and depends on transmission intensity and stability, rain cycles, age of patients and anopheline fauna. in latin america, according to the results of thick blood smear, 0.46% of confirmed infections were mxpi, and with pcr, that proportion reached 12.78%. in colombia, between 2001 and 2010, mxm (1.839 cases per year) represented an average of 1.44% of the total malaria cases. to our knowledge, this is the first report about baseline data on mxpi/mxm in colombia and latin america.