Fatal pneumococcal septicaemia in coeliac disease.

Overwhelming pneumococcal septicaemia in a patient with ulcerative colitis and splenic atrophy.

This report describes a young woman with ulcerative colitis who developed rapidly fatal pneumococcal septicaemia. Necropsy revealed splenic atrophy. This case supports the hypothesis that splenic atrophy might contribute to the morbidity of ulcerative colitis. The occurrence of splenic atrophy in ulcerative colitis is now well established. Splenic atrophy from other causes has been associated w...

Letter: Fatal pneumococcal septicaemia in an 8-year-old child after splenectomy for trauma.

Fatal pneumococcal septicaemia associated with asplenia and isomerism of the right atrial appendages.

A 22 month old male infant with isomerism of the right atrial appendages (associated with a complete atrioventricular septal defect, double outlet right ventricle, and pulmonary valve stenosis) died from pneumococcal septicaemia after a 36 hour illness. He had not been given penicillin prophylaxis. Asplenia was confirmed at necropsy. In a survey of 50 paediatric cardiologists in the United King...

How many episodes of hospital care might be prevented by widespread uptake of pneumococcal conjugate vaccine?

BACKGROUND It is likely that disease specific infectious morbidity is under-reported. Microbiologically identifiable diseases may be "hidden" in ICD-10 code as "unspecified" disease. AIMS To estimate the proportion of "unspecified" morbidity of infectious cause in infants and young children reported by Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) in England in 1999 that could reasonably be attributed to...

Pneumococcal Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome despite a normal spleen.

A previously fit 56 year old female presented with a rapidly progressive and fatal pneumococcal septicaemia with disseminated intravascular coagulation. Post-mortem studies confirmed a Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome and revealed an anatomically normal spleen; intracellular diplococci were seen within splenic macrophages providing evidence of normal splenic function. This appears to be only th...