scholarly journals Bilateral Sensorineural Deafness in a Young Pregnant Female Presenting with a Fever: A Rare Complication of a Reemerging Disease—Spotted Fever Group Rickettsioses

2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
A. G. T. A. Kariyawasam ◽  
D. R. Palangasinghe ◽  
C. L. Fonseka ◽  
P. U. T. De Silva ◽  
T. E. Kanakkahewa ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Rare Complication ◽  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Sensorineural Deafness ◽  
Febrile Illness ◽  
Maculopapular Rash ◽  
Pregnant Female ◽  
Rickettsia Conorii ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Case Presentation ◽  
Bilateral Deafness

Background. Rickettsial illnesses are a group of arthropod-borne remerging diseases. They are subdivided into three groups as typhus, spotted fever, and scrub typhus group. Complications such as reversible bilateral deafness due to spotted fever rickettsioses are infrequently reported in the literature. Case Presentation. We present a young pregnant female who developed bilateral sensorineural deafness on the fifth day of an acute febrile illness with a maculopapular rash. Rickettsia conorii IgG (>1/450) became highly positive, and she received oral azithromycin for ten days with complete resolution of fever and rash. The sensorineural deafness slowly improved over several months. Conclusion. Sensorineural deafness is a rare complication of spotted fever group rickettsioses. Since usage of doxycycline is controversial in pregnancy, azithromycin gave a favourable recovery of fever. Sensorineural deafness took several months to resolve after completion of antibiotics.

scholarly journals An Atypical Case of Rickettsial Spotted Fever Myocarditis Mimicking Weil’s Disease

2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
N. D. B. Ehelepola ◽  
G. D. N. R. Kumara ◽  
S. A. C. S. Sapurugala ◽  
W. M. N. P. Buddhadasa ◽  
Wasantha P. Dissanayake
Keyword(s):  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Supportive Therapy ◽  
Febrile Illness ◽  
Hemorrhagic Fever ◽  
Rickettsia Conorii ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Serological Tests ◽  
Dark Urine ◽  
Weil’S Disease ◽  
Weil's Disease

A 65-year-old previously healthy male presented to us on the fourth day of a febrile illness with headache, arthralgia, myalgia, nausea, cough, chest pain, sore throat, and passing of watery stools and dark urine with a history of exposure to leptospirosis during a dengue outbreak. On examination, there was dehydration and hypovolemia, and an ultrasound scan revealed capillary leakage. His liver transaminases, serum creatine, blood urea, C-reactive protein, and neutrophil percentage were high, and thrombocytopenia was present. Moreover, myocarditis has been detected too. Supportive therapy with intravenous ceftriaxone was administered, considering possible Weil’s disease or dengue hemorrhagic fever with secondary bacterial infection. Serological tests, performed later, diagnosed him with a Rickettsia conorii infection and excluded dengue, leptospirosis, and hantavirus infections. Repeat 2D echocardiograms showed mild improvement of his cardiac failure after one month and a more improvement after eight months. Clinical features of the rickettsial spotted fever group (SFG) and leptospirosis overlap. Leptospirosis is common; thus, the risk of overlooking SFG and diagnosing leptospirosis is likely. Tests for differentiation are unavailable in Sri Lankan hospitals and in many other developing countries. Empirical doxycycline in suspected cases of SFG infections in areas where rickettsioses are prevalent can save lives as in this case.

scholarly journals Rickettsial Diseases: Not Uncommon Causes of Acute Febrile Illness in India

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 59
Author(s):  
Manisha Biswal ◽  
Sivanantham Krishnamoorthi ◽  
Kamlesh Bisht ◽  
Amit Sehgal ◽  
Jasleen Kaur ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Febrile Illness ◽  
Epidemiological Studies ◽  
North India ◽  
Rickettsia Conorii ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Acute Febrile Illness ◽  
Serological Tests ◽  
Loss Of Appetite ◽  
Rickettsial Diseases

Rickettsial diseases (RDs) are major under-diagnosed causes of arthropod borne acute febrile illness (AFI) presenting with a range of symptoms from mild self-limiting fever to fatal sepsis. The spotted fever group (SFG) and typhus group (TG) are major RDs, which are commonly caused by Rickettsia conorii and Rickettsia typhi, respectively. The limited availability and role of serological tests in the acute phase of illness warrants rapid reliable molecular methods for diagnosis and epidemiological studies. Two hundred patients with AFI in whom the routine fever diagnostics were negative, were enrolled over a period of two months (April 2019 to May 2019). DNA was extracted and in-house nested PCR using primers specific for both SPG and TG pathogens was used. The positive amplified products were sequenced for species identification and phylogenetic analysis was performed using MEGA 7.0.14 software (iGEM, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA 19122, USA). The demographic details of the RD cases were documented. The prevalence of RD among AFI cases was 7% (14/200); SFG and TG were identified as the cause in 4% and 3% of AFI cases, respectively. The median age of the RD cases was 22 years (range 2–65). The median duration of fever was 3 days (range 1–12). The RD cases presented with respiratory symptoms or signs (44.44%), jaundice (22.22%), abdominal pain (22.22%), diarrhea (22.22), vesicular rash (11.11%), vomiting (11.11%), loss of appetite (11.11%), headache (11.11%), leukocytosis (88.88% with mean count 22,750/mm3), and thrombocytopenia (33.33%). The cases were treated empirically with piperacillin-tazobactam (66.66%), clindamycin (44.44%), cefotaxime (33.33%), meropenem (33.33%), metronidazole (33.33%), doxycycline (22.22%), azithromycin (22.22%), ceftriaxone (11.11%), and amoxicillin-clavulanic acid (11.11%). The mortality among the RD cases was 11.11%. The present pilot study shows that RD is not an uncommon cause of AFI in north India. The febrile episodes are usually transient, not severe and associated with heterogenous clinical presentation without documented history of tick exposure in the hospitalized patients. The transient, non-severe, febrile illness could be due to transient rickettsemia resulting from empirical antimicrobial therapy as the rickettsial organisms are expected to be more susceptible to higher doses of β-lactam antibiotics. The study emphasizes the molecular method as a useful tool to identify rickettsial etiology in AFI.

scholarly journals Significant Growth by Rickettsia Species within Human Macrophage-Like Cells Is a Phenotype Correlated with the Ability to Cause Disease in Mammals

Pathogens ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 228
Author(s):  
M. Nathan Kristof ◽  
Paige E. Allen ◽  
Lane D. Yutzy ◽  
Brandon Thibodaux ◽  
Christopher D. Paddock ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Endothelial Cells ◽  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Growth Characteristic ◽  
Human Macrophage ◽  
Rickettsia Conorii ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever ◽  
Phagocytic Cells ◽  
Pathogenic Potential ◽  
Rickettsia Species

Rickettsia are significant sources of tick-borne diseases in humans worldwide. In North America, two species in the spotted fever group of Rickettsia have been conclusively associated with disease of humans: Rickettsia rickettsii, the causative agent of Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and Rickettsia parkeri, the cause of R. parkeri rickettsiosis. Previous work in our lab demonstrated non-endothelial parasitism by another pathogenic SFG Rickettsia species, Rickettsia conorii, within THP-1-derived macrophages, and we have hypothesized that this growth characteristic may be an underappreciated aspect of rickettsial pathogenesis in mammalian hosts. In this work, we demonstrated that multiple other recognized human pathogenic species of Rickettsia, including R. rickettsii, R. parkeri, Rickettsia africae, and Rickettsiaakari can grow within target endothelial cells as well as within PMA-differentiated THP-1 cells. In contrast, Rickettsia bellii, a Rickettsia species not associated with disease of humans, and R. rickettsii strain Iowa, an avirulent derivative of pathogenic R. rickettsii, could invade both cell types but proliferate only within endothelial cells. Further analysis revealed that similar to previous studies on R. conorii, other recognized pathogenic Rickettsia species could grow within the cytosol of THP-1-derived macrophages and avoided localization with two different markers of lysosomal compartments; LAMP-2 and cathepsin D. R. bellii, on the other hand, demonstrated significant co-localization with lysosomal compartments. Collectively, these findings suggest that the ability of pathogenic rickettsial species to establish a niche within macrophage-like cells could be an important factor in their ability to cause disease in mammals. These findings also suggest that analysis of growth within mammalian phagocytic cells may be useful to predict the pathogenic potential of newly isolated and identified Rickettsia species.

scholarly journals Characterization of Mutations in therpoB Gene in Naturally Rifampin-ResistantRickettsia Species

1999 ◽  
Vol 43 (10) ◽  
pp. 2400-2403 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel Drancourt ◽  
Didier Raoult
Keyword(s):  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Single Point ◽  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Single Point Mutation ◽  
Rickettsia Conorii ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Resistant Species ◽  
Encoding Gene ◽  
Group Species

ABSTRACT Rickettsiae are gram-negative, obligately intracellular bacteria responsible for arthropod-borne spotted fevers and typhus. Experimental studies have delineated a cluster of naturally rifampin-resistant spotted fever group species. We sequenced the 4,122- to 4,125-bp RNA polymerase β-subunit-encoding gene (rpoB) from typhus and spotted fever group representatives and obtained partial sequences for all naturally rifampin-resistant species. A single point mutation resulting in a phenylalanine-to-leucine change at position 973 of theRickettsia conorii rpoB sequence and present in all the rifampin-resistant species was absent in all the rifampin-susceptible species. rpoB-based phylogenetic relationships among these rickettsial species yielded topologies which were in accordance with previously published phylogenies.

scholarly journals Epidemiology of Spotted Fever Group Rickettsioses and Acute Undifferentiated Febrile Illness in Villeta, Colombia

2017 ◽  
Vol 97 (3) ◽  
pp. 782-788 ◽  
Author(s):  
Álvaro A. Faccini-Martínez ◽  
Elkin Valbuena ◽  
Christian Barreto ◽  
Ana M. Palomar ◽  
Luis J. Polo-Terán ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Febrile Illness ◽  
Spotted Fever Group

scholarly journals Optimization and Evaluation of a Multiplex Quantitative PCR Assay for Detection of Nucleic Acids in Human Blood Samples from Patients with Spotted Fever Rickettsiosis, Typhus Rickettsiosis, Scrub Typhus, Monocytic Ehrlichiosis, and Granulocytic Anaplasmosis

2020 ◽  
Vol 58 (9) ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan E. Reller ◽  
J. Stephen Dumler
Keyword(s):  
Quantitative Pcr ◽  
Scrub Typhus ◽  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Febrile Illness ◽  
Epidemiologic Studies ◽  
Qpcr Assay ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Analytical Sensitivity ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Real Time Quantitative Pcr

ABSTRACT Spotted fever group rickettsioses (SFGR), typhus group rickettsioses (TGR), scrub typhus (caused by Orientia tsutsugamushi), ehrlichiosis, and anaplasmosis often present as undifferentiated fever but are not treated by agents (penicillins and cephalosporins) typically used for acute febrile illness. Inability to diagnose these infections when the patient is acutely ill leads to excess morbidity and mortality. Failure to confirm these infections retrospectively if a convalescent blood sample is not obtained also impairs epidemiologic and clinical research. We designed a multiplex real-time quantitative PCR (qPCR) assay to detect SFGR, TGR, O. tsutsugamushi, and infections caused by Anaplasma phagocytophilum and Ehrlichia chaffeensis with the ompA, 17-kDa surface antigen gene, tsa56, msp2 (p44), and vlpt gene targets, respectively. Analytical sensitivity was ≥2 copies/μl (linear range, 2 to 2 × 105) and specificity was 100%. Clinical sensitivities for SFGR, TGR, and O. tsutsugamushi were 25%, 20%, and 27%, respectively, and specificities were 98%, 99%, and 100%, respectively. Clinical sensitivities for A. phagocytophilum and E. chaffeensis were 93% and 84%, respectively, and specificities were 99% and 98%, respectively. This multiplex qPCR assay could support early clinical diagnosis and treatment, confirm acute infections in the absence of a convalescent-phase serum sample, and provide the high-throughput testing required to support large clinical and epidemiologic studies. Because replication of SFGR and TGR in endothelial cells results in very low bacteremia, optimal sensitivity of qPCR for these rickettsioses will require use of larger volumes of input DNA, which could be achieved by improved extraction of DNA from blood and/or extraction of DNA from a larger initial volume of blood.

scholarly journals Searching and Finding the Hidden Treasure: A Retrospective Analysis of Rickettsial Disease Among Dutch International Travelers

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sophia G de Vries ◽  
Louise E van Eekeren ◽  
Hans van der Linden ◽  
Benjamin J Visser ◽  
Martin P Grobusch ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Retrospective Analysis ◽  
Medical Records ◽  
Scrub Typhus ◽  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Febrile Illness ◽  
Empiric Antibiotic Therapy ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Orientia Tsutsugamushi ◽  
Rickettsial Disease ◽  
Empiric Antibiotic

Abstract Background Rickettsial disease (RD) is a prevalent and underestimated cause of febrile illness worldwide, especially in the absence of an inoculation eschar. We attempted to quantify this underestimation at our clinic, by investigating past cases of febrile illness in travelers who had tested negative for leptospirosis, a disease that can initially present similarly to non-eschar RD, and which we routinely consider when other important causes of unspecified febrile illness have tested negative. Methods We performed a retrospective analysis in febrile returned travelers from Asia, Africa, or the Americas between 2010 and 2017, who had tested negative for leptospirosis. Serologic immunofluorescence assays were performed for Orientia tsutsugamushi (scrub typhus), typhus group, and spotted fever group RD. We performed a medical records review of all patients who tested positive. In case of a fitting medical history, cases were deemed either confirmed (based on convalescent serology) or suspected (based on single serology). Results Among 97 patients, convalescent serology was available in 16 (16.5%) patients, and a single serology in 81 (83.5%) patients. RD was the likely diagnosis in 8 of 16 (50.0%) patients with convalescent serology, and in 8 of 81 (9.9%) with single serology. Of the 16 confirmed/suspected cases, 11 (69%) had been missed and 7 (44%) had not received adequate empiric antibiotic therapy. Conclusions This study shows that non-eschar RD is an important and poorly recognized cause of illness in travelers, even in a specialized travel clinic. A lower threshold to test and treat for RD is warranted in returning travelers with febrile illness.

POSSIBILITY OF SEROLOGICAL VERIFICATION OF SIBERIAN TICK TYPHUS WITH THE TEST SYSTEM FOR IDENTIFICATION OF RICKETTSIA CONORII ANTIBODIES

2019 ◽  
Vol 64 (9) ◽  
pp. 553-559
Author(s):  
N. V. Rudakov ◽  
S. V. Shtrek ◽  
A. I. Blokh ◽  
N. A. Penjevskaya ◽  
L. D. Shchuchinova
Keyword(s):  
Clinical Symptoms ◽  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Laboratory Diagnosis ◽  
Test System ◽  
Elisa Test ◽  
Rickettsia Conorii ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Igm Antibodies ◽  
Negative Results ◽  
Sensitivity Specificity

The real epidemiological impact of Spotted Fever Group rickettsioses including Siberian tick-borne typhus (STT) in Russia is not sufficiently studied. One of the reasons is the actual absence of either certified domestic diagnostic kits or the evidence for using foreign test kits for laboratory verification of this group of tick-borne infections in medical practice. Objective of our study was to study the diagnostic accuracy of the ELISA test system based on Rickettsia conorii antigens for serological verification of STT. The ROC analysis was performed and operational characteristics (sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, likelihood ratio of positive and negative results) of the STT serological verification test to identify IgM to rickettsia at different times from the onset of the disease using a test system to detect antibodies to Rickettsia conorii were calculated based on the results of a survey of two groups of patients comparable by gender and age (34 patients with pathognomonic signs of STT and 76 clinically healthy people). It was found that the detection of IgM antibodies to rickettsia using the Rickettsia conorii IgM/IgG ELISA test system (Vircell) allows the disease to be verified 10-14 days after the onset of clinical symptoms in 72% (56-88%) of STT patients. We recommend the interpretation of results of the test system “Rickettsia conorii ELISA IgM/IgG” for serological verification of STT which differ from the manufacturer’s recommendations regarding verification of Mediterranean fever caused by R. conorii in the following way: the diagnosis of STT should be considered laboratory confirmed when the index of IgM antibodies (IAT) exceeds 8.0; if the IAT is less than 5.0 then a repeated examination of the patient after 10-14 days will be necessary; if the IAT is in the range of 5.0-8.0 then the sample should be re-examined and / or the patient should be examined after 10-14 days. The use of the test system “Rickettsia conorii ELISA IgM / IgG” is promising for laboratory diagnosis and seroepidemiological studies of Spotted Fever Group rickettsioses in Russia.

scholarly journals Taxonomic Relationships among Spotted Fever Group Rickettsiae as Revealed by Antigenic Analysis with Monoclonal Antibodies

1998 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 887-896 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wenbin Xu ◽  
Didier Raoult
Keyword(s):  
Monoclonal Antibodies ◽  
Phylogenetic Analyses ◽  
Spotted Fever ◽  
Rickettsia Conorii ◽  
Spotted Fever Group ◽  
Antigenic Analysis ◽  
Taxonomic Relationships ◽  
Rickettsia Africae ◽  
Rickettsia Slovaca ◽  
Rickettsia Sibirica

The spotted fever group (SFG) is made up of more than 20 different rickettsial species and strains. Study of the taxonomic relationships among the group has been attempted by phenotypic, genotypic, and phylogenetic analyses. In this study, we determined taxonomic relationships among the SFG rickettsiae by comparative analysis of immunogenic epitopes reactive against a panel of monoclonal antibodies. A total of 98 monoclonal antibodies, which were directed against epitopes on the major immunodominant proteins or on the lipopolysaccharide-like antigens of strains of Rickettsia africae, Rickettsia conorii, Rickettsia massiliae, Rickettsia akari, Rickettsia sibirica, and Rickettsia slovaca, were used in the study. The distribution and expression of the epitopes among 29 SFG rickettsiae and Rickettsia bellii were assessed by determination of reaction titers in a microimmunofluorescence assay. The results were scored as numerical taxonomic data, and cluster analysis was used to construct a dendrogram. The architecture of this dendrogram was consistent with previous taxonomic studies, and the implications of this and other findings are discussed.

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