Fungal meningitis

Fungal meningitis
Fungus (black) in brain tissue
Classification and external resources
MeSH D016921

Fungal meningitis refers to meningitis caused by a fungal infection.

One form of fungal meningitis is cryptococcal meningitis.[1] Patients treated for cancer or chronic illnesses where treatments and/or the disease itself compromise the patient's immune system are particularly vulnerable. Most common in AIDS patients, cryptococcal fungal meningitis cases have increased globally during the past decade. National health data estimates the incidence to be approximately 1,500 cases annually in the U.S. [2][3][4]

New England Compounding Center meningitis outbreak

As of November 5, 2012, the CDC reported that 409 patients had laboratory-confirmed fungal meningitis caused by injections with contaminated medication.There had been 30 fatalities. A black mold, Exserohilum rostratum, was found in 45 of these cases. Aspergillus fumigatus was found in one case, and a Cladosporium species was found in one case.[5] Aspergillus has been very rarely associated with meningitis[6] while cases caused explicitly by Exserohilum in otherwise healthy individuals have not been previously reported.[7]

References

  1. Safdieh JE, Mead PA, Sepkowitz KA, Kiehn TE, Abrey LE (March 2008). "Bacterial and fungal meningitis in patients with cancer". Neurology. 70 (12): 943–7. doi:10.1212/01.wnl.0000305960.85546.5f. PMID 18347316.
  2. Jaiswal SP, Hemwani N, Sharma N, Athale S, Chitnis DS (July 2002). "Prevalence of fungal meningitis among HIV positive & negative subjects in Indore (MP state)". Indian J Med Sci. 56 (7): 325–9. PMID 12645168.
  3. Slavoski LA, Tunkel AR (April 1995). "Therapy of fungal meningitis". Clin Neuropharmacol. 18 (2): 95–112. doi:10.1097/00002826-199504000-00001. PMID 8635178.
  4. Long Island Man and Grandfather Beats Fungal Meningitis
  5. "Current Situation:CDC Responds to Multistate Fungal Meningitis Outbreak". CDC. 18 October 2012. Retrieved 21 October 2012.
  6. Badiee P, Alborzi A (2011). “Assessment of a real-time PCR method to detect human non-cryptococcal fungal meningitis”. Arch Iran Med.14(6):381-4. PMID 22039841
  7. A Adler, I Yaniv, Z Samra, J Yacobovich, S Fisher, G Avrahami, I Levy (2006). “Exserohilum: an emerging human pathogen.” Eur J Clin Microbiol Infect Dis. 2006 Mar 2;: 16511679


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