Thrush Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Thrush, including details on oral, vaginal, symptoms, prevention, treatment, infection.

Candida parapsilosis endocarditis: a comparative review of the literature.

Garzoni C, Nobre VA, Garbino J

Division of Infectious Diseases, University Hospitals of Geneva, 24 Rue Micheli-du-Crest, Geneva 14, Switzerland. Christian.Garzoni@insel.ch

Fungal endocarditis (FE) is an uncommon disease, and while accounting for only 1.3-6% of all cases of infectious endocarditis, it carries a high mortality risk. Although Candida albicans represents the main etiology of FE, C. parapsilosis is the most common non-albicans species. We report the case of a 32-year-old man with a history of prior intravenous drug (IVD) use hospitalized with endocarditis due to C. parapsilosis and review all 71 additional cases documented in the literature. A retrospective analysis of the 72 C. parapsilosis cases compared to 52 recently reviewed cases of C. albicans endocarditis was conducted to identify organism-specific clinical peculiarities. The most common predisposing factor for C. parapsilosis endocarditis (41/72; 57.4%) involved prosthetic valves followed by IVD use (12/72; 20%). Peripheral embolic and/or hemorrhagic events occurred in 28/64 (43.8%) patients, mostly in cerebral and lower limb territories. Overall mortality was 41.7%. Combined surgical and clinical treatment was associated with a lower mortality. Few patients received the newer antifungal agents, and it would appear that more experience is required for their use in the treatment of C. parapsilosis endocarditis.

Published 8 November 2007 in Eur J Clin Microbiol Infect Dis, 26(12): 915-26.
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