Endemic and epidemic group A meningococcal meningitis remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality in sub-Saharan Africa, despite the availability of the safe and inexpensive group A meningococcal polysaccharide vaccine, which is protective at all ages when administered as directed. Despite optimal therapy, meningococcal meningitis has a 10% fatality rate and at least 15% central nervous sy...

Purpose: The aim of this study is to use a defined population of patients with meningococcal septicaemia to calculate the incidence of orthopaedic complications. Methods: Medical records and radiographs were analysed retrospectively for all patients admitted to the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) of the Bristol Royal Hospital for Children from 01/01/2001 to 31/12/2012 with a primary diagn...

The Islamic Hajj to Makkah (Mecca) has been associated with outbreaks of invasive meningococcal disease and the global spread of Neisseria meningitidis serogroup W-135. For Hajj pilgrims the quadrivalent vaccination against serogroups A, C, W-135 and Y is a mandatory requirement. Novel conjugate vaccines may provide benefits for the community by reduction of carriage. With the introduction of t...

Ala’Aldeen, D. A. et al. (2000) “Dynamics of meningococcal long term carriage among university students and their implications for mass vaccination” J Clin Microbiol 38(6):2311-2316. Andrews, N et al. (2003) “Validation of serological correlate of protection for meningococcal C conjugate vaccine by using efficacy estimates from postlicensure surveillance in England” Clin Diagn Lab Immunol 10(5)...

The authors report a case of deficiency of the eighth component of complement in a young adult with a history of three episodes of meningitis; one of them proved to be meningococcal. The literature was reviewed and meningitis due to Neisseria meningitidis strains causing disease in complement-deficient and complement-sufficient patients was demonstrated. Meningococcal disease may be the first m...

Neisseria meningitidis is the bacterium that causes meningococcal disease, one of the leading sources of community-acquired sepsis and meningitis among children. Both sporadic and epidemic disease can occur, and a large number of individuals can become infected within a short period of time. The manner by which meningococcal disease strikes previously healthy individuals, with a rapid progressi...

The association of Neisseria meningitidis infection and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is uncommon. We describe here three patients with SLE who developed disseminated meningococcal disease. Each patient had long-standing SLE and was receiving treatment with prednisone. Furthermore, each patient showed serum hypocomplementemia at the time of the infection. N. meningitidis Group Y, considere...

Methods to identify intact multi-protein complexes can help to achieve more effective formulations but their application to OMVs can be difficult due to the hydrophobicity of membrane proteins. Our previous studies of the meningococcal porin complexes using blue native polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (BNE) (1) allowed the detection of a 700 kDa major complex. Analysis by LC/MS-MS revealed th...

We describe a case of primary meningococcal C pericarditis with myocardial involvement in a 71-year-old male that is thus far the oldest patient with isolated meningococcal pericardial disease and only the third patient with primary meningococcal myopericarditis described in English literature. Our patient was successfully treated by full sternotomy and surgical drainage combined with intraveno...

The nasopharynx of known meningococcal carriers without signs of acute meningococcal disease as well as cerebrospinal fluid from patients with acute meningococcal disease were cultured on Thayer-Martin agar. Pili were observed in negatively stained preparations of over 80% cells from all primary cultures of both nasopharnyx and cerebrospinal fluids. Although pili were abundant on cells from al...