S. aureus bacteremia with acute transverse myelitis case report: utility of molecular techniques.

We report a rare case of bacteremia with concomitant acute transverse myelitis (ATM) without evidence of a primary infectious focus or secondary localization due to Staphylococcus aureus in a 60-year-old man admitted for hyperpyrexia, quadriplegia, and respiratory failure. Bacterial ATM is a rare clinical entity with confusing clinical presentation and challenging diagnosis; isolated bacterial infections of the spinal cord without secondary localization or contiguous foci are exceptionally rare, as is S. aureus as the cause of infection. In this case, a rapid etiologic diagnosis was made possible by close collaboration between clinicians, infectious disease specialists and clinical microbiologists combined with extended molecular testing on CSF guided by incoming results.

Clostridium perfringens-induced massive hemolysis treatment with blood purification to target toxins: a case report.

Clostridium perfringens can rarely cause severe systemic infections, usually from an abdominal source, associated with massive hemolysis, which is usually fatal. Hemolytic anemia and acute renal injury resulting from toxin action are critical for the development of multiple organ dysfunction syndrome (MODs), making this condition a real emergency, requiring multispecialty skills and aggressive multimodal therapies. We herein describe a case of septic shock from acute cholecystitis with massive hemolysis caused by C. perfringens in a 55 year-old man that was successfully treated with early blood purification and continuous renal replacement therapy (CRRT) along with antibiotic therapy and surgery. The effect of the enormous amount of toxins produced by Clostridium which elicit a strong cytokine response and the damage caused by the hemolysis products are the main pathogenetic mechanisms of this rare but lethal clinical entity. The main goal of treatment is to remove toxins from plasma, block toxin action, and further production by achieving bacterial killing with antimicrobial agents and controlling the infectious focus, remove waste products and prevent or limit multiorgan damage. Blood purification techniques play an important role due to a strong pathophysiological rationale, as they can remove toxins and cytokines as well as cell-free products from plasma and also replace renal function. Although this condition is rare and robust data are lacking, blood purification techniques for C. perfringens-induced massive hemolysis are promising and should be further explored.