Fatal disseminated mucormycosis in an immunocompotent patient: a case report and literature review

ABSTRACT

Disseminated mucormycosis is a rare entity most frequently seen in neutropenic patients with hematologic malignancies, post transplants or in patients on deferoxamine therapy. We report a 64-year-old immunocompetent male with an acute pneumonia and a generalized jaundice who died within 24 h. In the autopsy, extensive perforations of spleen and multiple hemorrhage foci on the pancreas were two significant findings. Histopathological study of tissue sections revealed typical zygomycetes hyphae in the left lung, pancreas, spleen and brain. Involvement of pancreas in this patient was one of the rare features of mucormycosis reported occasionally in the literature. Our case implies an unusual clinical presentation of disseminated mucormycosis and highlights that disseminated mucormycosis should be regarded even in the immunocompetent patients