Yersinia enterocolitica bacteraemia and hemochromatosis – Case report

Abstract

The authors present a case of a patient with 66 years old, admitted
for fever, diaphoresis, myalgia, mental obtundation and pain in the
right hypochondriac area, with two weeks duration. The imagiologic study of the liver, shows a mycronodular pattern suggestive of
abcedation. Yersinia enterocolitica grows in the hemocultures. The
analytic panel shows a gross alteration of the iron metabolism,
and the histopathology of the liver gave a picture of cirrhosis and
stage 4 siderosis, pointing to the coexistence of hemochromatosis,
verified to be genetically determined by C282Y mutation of the
HFE gene. The patient was treated with a sequence of antibiotics,
including a quinolone, progressing with a sustained but protracted
clinical and radiological resolution, without reinfection or late
complications. To the comments to the case, a brief review of
the septicaemia and liver abscess by the yersinia enterocolitica,
in the overload iron states, is added.