Abscess of adrenal gland caused by disseminated subacute Nocardia farcinica pneumonia. A case report and mini-review of the literature.
BACKGROUND
Infections caused by Nocardia farcinica are uncommon and show a great variety of clinical manifestations in immunocompetent and immunocompromised patients. Because of its unspecific symptoms and tendency to disseminate it may mimic the clinical symptoms and radiologic findings of a tumour disease and the diagnosis of nocardiosis can easily be missed, because there are no characteristic symptoms.


METHODS
We present a case of an adrenal gland abscess caused by subacute disseminated N. farcinica pneumonia.


CONCLUSIONS
An infection with N. farcinica is potentially lethal because of its tendency to disseminate -particularly in the brain- and its high resistance to antibiotics. Awareness of this differential diagnosis allows early and appropriate treatment to be administered.
Tachezy
Michael
M
Department of General-, Visceral- and Thoracic Surgery, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Germany. mtachezy@uke.uni-hamburg.de
Simon
Philipp
P
Ilchmann
Corina
C
Vashist
Yogesh K
YK
Izbicki
Jakob R
JR
Gawad
Karim A
KA
D000038:Abscess / Q000209:etiology* / Q000382:microbiology; D000311:Adrenal Glands / Q000382:microbiology / Q000473:pathology*; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D009615:Nocardia; D009617:Nocardia Infections / Q000150:complications* / Q000473:pathology; D018410:Pneumonia, Bacterial / Q000150:complications* / Q000382:microbiology / Q000473:pathology