Fifty eight patients (aged 8-59 years, mean 27) treated for prosthetic valve endocarditis from January 1966 to January 1985 were studied retrospectively by review of case notes. There were 12 cases of early and 46 cases of late prosthetic valve endocarditis. These developed in 28 patients with an isolated aortic valve, in 26 with an isolated mitral valve, and in four with both aortic and mitral...

BACKGROUND Endocarditis due to vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) is rare, and the literature consists almost exclusively of reports of single cases. METHODS We report a case of VRE prosthetic valve endocarditis and review 18 cases of native and prosthetic valve VRE endocarditis reported in the literature. RESULTS The majority of cases were due to Enterococcus faecium. Nearly all of the...

THE advent of a wide spectrum of bactericidal antibiotic agents has enabled physicians to treat many cases of bacterial endocarditis with a high likelihood of success. There remain, however, a significant number of patients with endocarditis in whom the infection is more resistant to antimicrobial therapy, valve destruction more rapid, and a satisfactory response to medical therapy sufficiently...

background infective endocarditis is one of the most important complications of injection drug use, which is associated with significant mortality and morbidity. the aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of vegetation size and localization on outcome and in-hospital mortality of infective endocarditis. patients and methods a total of 34 patients were admitted to a university hospital ...

This is the case of a young male suffering from Austrian syndrome, which is the triad of endocarditis, meningitis, and pneumonia due to invasive S. pneumoniae infection. He reported recurrent fever for six months without any antibiotic treatment, which may have determined the further course of the syndrome. Echocardiography revealed massive native valve endocarditis, and the patient was conside...

A 66-year-old man with a bioprosthetic aortic valve developed Streptococcus bacteremia and was treated with antibiotics. He responded well to this therapy, and no evidence of bioprosthetic valve endocarditis (BVE) was detected at this time. One-and-a-half years after the antibiotic therapy for bacteremia, the patient was referred to our department with a diagnosis of acute cardiac failure. Tran...

Staphylococcus warneri, a coagulase negative staphylococcus, has been isolated in prosthetic device-related infections and has been reported as a rare cause of endocarditis. We report a case of prosthetic aortic valve S. warneri endocarditis, in which the patient lacked typical infectious signs and symptoms, instead presenting with congestive heart failure due to perforation of the valve. Provi...

We report the case of a 64-year-old man with Arcanobacterium pyogenes endocarditis. The patient presented with dyspnea and asymmetrical progressive quadriparesis. A transthoracic echocardiogram revealed mobile vegetations on both leaflets of his mitral valve measuring 0.5 x 3 cm, thickening of the mitral valve with severe mitral regurgitation due to dehiscence of the papillary muscle to the pos...

Abnormality of a valve predisposes to bacterial endocarditis, even when mechanical beating action is absent, as in destruction of a cusp by previous rheumatic disease. Yet the formation of vegetations at sites other than valvular endocardium is rare; and, in spite of the frequency and apparent suitability of aortic ulcers, no report of bacterial endarteritis upon simple atheroma has been found ...

Physical check-ups among athletes with valvular heart disease are of significant relevance. In athletes with mitral valve stenosis the extent of allowed physical activity is dependant on the size of the left atrium and the severity of the valve defect. Patients with mild-to-moderate mitral valve regurgitation can participate in all types of sport associated with low and moderate isometric stres...