This report details the case of a 67 year old woman with sternal osteomyelitis caused by Aspergillus fumigatus. She was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease in 1975 and was successfully treated with chemotherapy. A lobectomy for recurrence localised to the left lung was complicated nine years later by severe bronchiectasis, for which she required a total left sided pneumonectomy. At surgery, a non-...

1 of 2 DESCRIPTION The incidence of mediastinal wound infection in patients undergoing open heart surgery can be up to 4%. 1 A subgroup of 20–30% of those patients as per El Oakley and Wright 2 develops deep sternal infections. Radical debridement is of a paramount importance, therefore sternal excision becomes a necessity in cases with severe sternal osteomyelitis. Under those circumstances va...

We report the case of a deep sternal wound infection with sternal osteomyelitis caused by Gordonia bronchialis after open-heart surgery. The isolate was identified as a G. bronchialis by 16S rRNA and hsp65 gene sequencing, having initially been misidentified as a Rhodococcus by a commercial phenotypic identification system.

Mycobacterium tuberculosis can infect multiple organs and may rarely cause osteomyelitis of the sternum. We report a patient with primary sternal tuberculosis who presented with a chest wall mass. A core needle biopsy confirmed the diagnosis-of tuberculosis. We review the literature regarding tuberculous osteomyelitis of the sternum.

Primary sternal osteomyelitis (PSO) is a rare condition that may develop without any contiguous focus of infection. Due to the rarity of the disease, early diagnosis and appropriate treatment are often delayed. Herein, we describe a patient with PSO caused by Staphylococcus aureus that presented with chest pain and fever. The patient had no predisposing factors for sternal osteomyelitis. The ch...

Primary tubercular osteomyelitis of sternum is a rare clinical entity and involvement of manubrio-sternal joint is even rarer, with only few cases reported in the literature. Tuberculous sternal involvement is seen in approximately 1% of all skeletal TB cases. We report an unusual case of primary manubrio-sternal joint tuberculosis presenting as vague anterior chest wall swelling and pain. ESR ...

OBJECTIVES Median sternotomy (MS) wound infections are severe complications causing high morbidity and mortality after cardiac surgery. We aimed to develop a new Staphylococcus aureus mediastinitis and sternal osteomyelitis model in rats that can be used to evaluate the efficacy of new antimicrobial treatments. METHODS AND RESULTS A complete MS wound was induced in anaesthetized rats. S. aure...