By morphological and morphometric analyses of serial sections the occurrence of T. cruzi nests in the central vein and in the parenchyma of adrenal glands, in the left ventricular wall and in the inferior vena cava wall in chronic Chagasic patients was studied. Of 36 cases 50% showed parasites in the adrenal central vein wall (total 29 nests), 3.1% showedparasites in the vena caval wall (only I nest) and 16,8% we found parasites in the myocardiocytes (total 23 nests). The density of parasites measured in the nests for each 100mm² of the tissue examined, was 0.585 for the adrenal vein, 0.001 for the vena cava and 0.01 for the myocardium. No nest was found in 269103.1mm² of adrenal parenchyma. Although the central vein area examined was smaller, it showed the largest frequency of T. cruzi nests. Since a basic difference between these tissues is the great quantity of corticoids in the blood of the adrenal central vein, this prevalence may be because of this hormonal ambient, which with its immunosupressor and anti-inflammatory effects could help T. cruzi survival
Adrenal; Inferior vena cava; Myocardium; Trypanosoma cruzi; Chagas disease