title: Correlation among Streptococcus bovis, endocarditis and septicemia in a patient with advanced colon cancer: a case report.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  One of the bacterial agents that has been found to be associated with colorectal cancer is Streptococcus bovis, with 13% of infective endocarditis cases caused by this pathogenic species.
  
  
  METHODS
  We describe the case of a 57-year-old Caucasian man with infiltrating and ulcerating metastatic adenocarcinoma of the sigmoid colon. The patient was receiving second-line chemotherapy treatment and, on the eighth day of the second cycle, he developed a grade IV pancytopenia. We diagnosed a severe sepsis with positive blood cultures for Streptococcus bovis/gallolyticus with a secondary endocarditis.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  A recent study suggests that the majority of patients affected by colonic cancer have a Streptococcus bovis/gallolyticus colonization that becomes apparent as an overt infection only when immunosystem disorders or cardiac valve lesions occur. This correlation is important for involving more specialists in a correct and early diagnosis of this rare, but potentially fatal, complication.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Oncology, Fondazione Poliambulanza, Via Bissolati 57, 25124, Brescia, Italy. chiara.abeni@poliambulanza.it.
authors.forename: Chiara
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Abeni
authors.forename: Luigina
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Rota
authors.forename: Chiara
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ogliosi
authors.forename: Paola
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Bertocchi
authors.forename: Pietro Berra
authors.initials: PB
authors.lastname: Centurini
authors.forename: Alberto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Zaniboni