Two Cases of Dengue Fever in Family Medicine

Dengue fever is an acute febrile illness caused by dengue virus infection. Found predominantly in tropical urban areas, dengue virus is transmitted to humans by a female mosquito vector, Aedes aegypti. The clinical features of dengue fever include fever, headache, skin rash and bleeding. These symptoms are usually mild and not fatal, but dengue hemorrhagic fever is life threatening without proper management. The diagnosis of dengue fever can be established with a dengue virus-infected cell culture or with isolated dengue IgM. No specific treatment exists for dengue fever except for symptomatic management. With the recent global increase of dengue fever incidence, the number of cases of dengue fever in returning travelers is on the increase in Korea. Therefore, it is possible that Korean primary physicians will confront dengue fever cases. We report two cases of dengue fever that we experienced in the Department of Family Medicine in 2007.