Staphylococcus lugdunensis as Cause of Septic Pericarditis.

Staphylococcus lugdunensis (S. lugdunensis) is a coagulase-negative gram-positive bacterium, considered part of skin flora, which can simultaneously cause human diseases. S. lugdunensis has been reported in the literature as one of the causative agents for infective endocarditis.1 Although one of the coagulasenegative staphylococci, S. lugdunensis shares many virulent characteristics with Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), including biofilm formation. It has been associated with various foreign body-related infections such as prosthetic joint infections,2 in addition to bacteremia, osteomyelitis, septic arthritis, central nervous system, urinary tract infections, peritonitis, infective endocarditis and others. Given the association with severe and aggressive infections, it is important to treat S. lugdunensis as true infection rather than a contaminant, particularly in a suspect clinical context.3-6 Currently, there are no reported cases in the literature on pericarditis secondary to S. lugdunensis. We present a case of a 69-year-old woman with pericarditis, sepsis and disseminated intravascular coagulopathy (DIC) due to S. lugdunensis.

Histoplasmosis in pregnancy: case series and report of transplacental transmission.

Although a healthy pregnancy seems to confer an increased susceptibility to systemic fungal infections, to our knowledge, no known association exists in the case of Histoplasma capsulatum. In addition, to our knowledge, transplacental transmission of H capsulatum has not been previously described. We describe a series of patients treated at our institutions between 1997 and 2000 with evidence of transplacental transmission of H capsulatum. Mechanisms of increased risk of histoplasmosis during pregnancy are proposed, although this risk has yet to be proved.