First Human Case of Fungal Keratitis Caused by a Putatively Novel Species of Lophotrichus

Allen O Eghrari; Connie Gibas; Tonya Watkins; Sina Vahedi; Rick Lee; Elizabeth Houle; Maria Jose Suarez; Charles Eberhart; Deanna A Sutton; Nathan P Wiederhold; Shameema Sikder; Sean X Zhang

doi:10.1128/JCM.00471-15

First Human Case of Fungal Keratitis Caused by a Putatively Novel Species of Lophotrichus

J Clin Microbiol. 2015 Sep;53(9):3063-7. doi: 10.1128/JCM.00471-15. Epub 2015 Jun 24.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Ophthalmology, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.
² University of Alberta Microfungus Collection and Herbarium, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
³ Department of Pathology, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.
⁴ Microbiology Laboratory, the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.
⁵ Fungus Testing Laboratory, Department of Pathology, University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio, Texas, USA.
⁶ Department of Ophthalmology, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA [email protected] [email protected].
⁷ Department of Pathology, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA Microbiology Laboratory, the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Maryland, USA [email protected] [email protected].

Abstract

We report an aggressive fungal keratitis caused by a putatively novel species of Lophotrichus in a patient with traumatic injury to the cornea from a dog paw. The organism was isolated from the patient's necrotic cornea, which perforated despite coverage with hourly fortified broad-spectrum topical antibiotic therapy. This report represents the first case of human infection caused by this species.

Publication types

Case Reports

MeSH terms

Animals
Ascomycota / isolation & purification*
Corneal Injuries / complications
Corneal Ulcer / diagnosis*
Corneal Ulcer / microbiology
Corneal Ulcer / pathology*
DNA, Fungal / chemistry
DNA, Fungal / genetics
DNA, Ribosomal Spacer / chemistry
DNA, Ribosomal Spacer / genetics
Dogs
Female
Histocytochemistry
Humans
Microbiological Techniques
Microscopy
Middle Aged
Molecular Sequence Data
Mycoses / diagnosis*
Mycoses / microbiology
Mycoses / pathology*
Sequence Analysis, DNA

Substances

DNA, Fungal
DNA, Ribosomal Spacer

Associated data

GENBANK/KM580494
GENBANK/KM609216