Question

"Endocarditis" Stop For the past 10 days, Jackie felt exhausted and lacked her usual stamina. Several times she ran a fever, which abated when she took acetaminophen. Just walking up the stairs left her short of breath. Since the symptoms seemed to be worsening, she visited her doctor. The doctor noted that her heart murmur, present since childhood, was noticeably louder and much more obvious, and there were petechiae under her fingernails. She had a temperature of 38.2°C at the time of the visit. When asked about her activities over the past month, she mentioned that she had a root canal done three weeks earlier. Suspecting possible endocarditis, the doctor ordered blood cultures, which were sent to the clinical microbiology lab. Thirty-six hours later, there was evidence of growth in the bottles. A Gram stain of the cultures showed gram-positive cocci. 24 h 24 h Analyte sample Isolation Stock Culture Back to cases Gram-positive

Answer 1

Endocarditis is the infection of inner lining of heart. Endocarditis is mostly caused by bacteria and rarely by fungi. Endocarditis is caused by bacteria entering the blood from mouth or other body parts and travel to heart and attack heart. Bacterial endocarditis is a serious fatal infection. The attacking of heart valves results in difficulty in breathing. The symptoms include fever, increased hurt murmur, shortness of breathing, body aches.

Bacteria present in body parts can enter to blood stream and reaches heart. Bacteria live in Mouth, enter to blood after dental procedures and attack heart lining. Staphylococcus and Streptococcus are two group of bacteria responsible for most of the bacterial endocarditis. Streptococcus is associated with tooth decay.

Staphylococcus spp. are associated with infection of teeth after root canal, that spread through blood causes endocarditis.

The gram positive cocci isolated from blood culture may be Staphylococcus spp.