Variations in symptomatology of ciguatera poisoning.

Ciguatera poisoning reports were examined for patterns of symptomatology when different types of fishes were consumed. Consumption of surgeon fish (Ctenochaetus strigosus), amberjack (Seriola dumerili) and jack (Caranx sp.) resulted in different symptom profiles with a number of statistically significant differences in the reported frequencies of specific symptoms. The results support the contention that the large variability in symptoms associated with ciguatera poisoning is caused by several closely related but distinct toxins.