TY - JOUR
T1 - Prosthetic valve endocarditis with Bartonella washoensis in a human European patient and its detection in red squirrels (Sciurus vulgaris)
AU - von Loewenich, Friederike D.
AU - Seckert, Christof
AU - Dauber, Elke
AU - Kik, Marja J.L.
AU - de Vries, Ankje
AU - Sprong, Hein
AU - Buschmann, Katja
AU - Aardema, Matthew L.
AU - Brandstetter, Moritz
PY - 2020/1
Y1 - 2020/1
N2 - Members of the genus Bartonella are fastidious Gram-negative facultative intracellular bacteria that are typically transmitted by arthropod vectors. Several Bartonella spp. have been found to cause culture-negative endocarditis in humans. Here, we report the case of a 75-year-old German woman with prosthetic valve endocarditis due to Bartonella washoensis. The infecting agent was characterized by sequencing of six housekeeping genes (16S rRNA, ftsZ, gltA, groEL, ribC, and rpoB), applying a multilocus sequence typing (MLST) approach. The 5,097 bp of the concatenated housekeeping gene sequence from the patient were 99.0% identical to a sequence from a B. washoensis strain isolated from a red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris orientis) from China. A total of 39% (24/62) of red squirrel (S. vulgaris) samples from the Netherlands were positive for the B. washoensis gltA gene variant detected in the patient. This suggests that the red squirrel is the reservoir host for human infection in Europe.
AB - Members of the genus Bartonella are fastidious Gram-negative facultative intracellular bacteria that are typically transmitted by arthropod vectors. Several Bartonella spp. have been found to cause culture-negative endocarditis in humans. Here, we report the case of a 75-year-old German woman with prosthetic valve endocarditis due to Bartonella washoensis. The infecting agent was characterized by sequencing of six housekeeping genes (16S rRNA, ftsZ, gltA, groEL, ribC, and rpoB), applying a multilocus sequence typing (MLST) approach. The 5,097 bp of the concatenated housekeeping gene sequence from the patient were 99.0% identical to a sequence from a B. washoensis strain isolated from a red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris orientis) from China. A total of 39% (24/62) of red squirrel (S. vulgaris) samples from the Netherlands were positive for the B. washoensis gltA gene variant detected in the patient. This suggests that the red squirrel is the reservoir host for human infection in Europe.
KW - Bartonella washoensis
KW - Endocarditis
KW - Europe
KW - Human
KW - Multilocus sequence typing (MLST)
KW - Red squirrel
KW - Reservoir
KW - Sciurus vulgaris
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85076152818&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1128/JCM.01404-19
DO - 10.1128/JCM.01404-19
M3 - Article
C2 - 31619523
AN - SCOPUS:85076152818
SN - 0095-1137
VL - 58
JO - Journal of Clinical Microbiology
JF - Journal of Clinical Microbiology
IS - 1
M1 - e01404-19
ER -