Atopobium rimae, previously
Lactobacillus rimae, is a strictly anaerobic, non-
spore forming grampositive rod which was frequently isolated from odontogenic
infection. We
report a case of A. rimae
bacteremia. A 47-yr-old man with
liver cirrhosis was admitted to the
hospital via
emergency room due to
fever and chill. His abdominal and pelvic computed
tomography revealed a small
abscess near the left
adrenal gland. Three sets of
blood cultures were taken and non-
spore forming, grampositive rods were detected in all anaerobic vials. This isolate grew small nonhemolytic, gray-
white translucent colonies on
Brucella blood agar and was obligatory anaerobic on
air-tolerance test. This organism was negative for
catalase, indole,
nitrate-reduction and
beta-lactamase and failed to identify by Vitek ANI card (bioMerieux,
France).
16S rRNA sequences of this showed 99.8% homology of the published sequence of A. rimae (
GenBank accession number AF292371). Aspirates of periadrenal
abscess grew
Escherichia coli and
Peptostreptococcus micros. He was treated with
metronidazole and
imipenem and follow-up
cultures of
blood were negative at days 4 and 10. To our
knowledge, this is the first
report of
bacteremia of A. rimae.