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P Brouqui

Publications and source records attributed to P Brouqui.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1992

Mediterranean spotted fever in Marseille: descriptive epidemiology and the influence of climatic factors.

The authors report the general epidemiologic features of Mediterranean spotted fever (MSF) in the Marseille area (South France). Age was a risk factor, increasing after 50 years, and annual incidence seemed positively correlated with the average temperature of the preceding year and negatively correlated with the number of days with frost of the preceding year. However, correlations were not significant.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1992

Epidemiologic features and clinical presentation of acute Q fever in hospitalized patients: 323 French cases.

PURPOSE: To contribute to the knowledge of epidemiologic and clinical features of patients hospitalized with Q fever in France. METHODS: We conducted a retrospective analysis of 22,496 sera submitted between 1982 and 1990 to the French National Reference Center for Rickettsial Diseases (NRC). The diagnosis of acute Q fever was based on an IgG titer greater than or equal to 1:200 and an IgM titer greater than or equal to 1:25 against phase II Coxiella burnetii antigen on an indirect immunofluorescence test (IFA). Fifteen cases prior to 1985 were diagnosed on the basis of a complement fixation titer greater than or equal to 1:8. A serosurvey of blood donors from Marseille was also conducted in 1988 on 924 sera, using IFA with a cutoff titer of 1:25. RESULTS: The serosurvey conducted in 1988 showed a seroprevalence of 4.03%, without age or sex prediction. The incidence rate of acute Q fever detection at the NRC was 0.58 per 100,000 inhabitants over the 9-year period. Three hundred twenty-three clinical cases were diagnosed, rising from 1 in 1982 to 107 in 1990. In patients hospitalized for acute Q fever, there was a significantly higher sex ratio of males to females (2.3), which, coupled with the age distribution, indicated that elder males, who are overrepresented due to our recruitment bias, are more susceptible to C. burnetii infections. The mean age of the patients was 45.5 years, while the risk was increased in the 30 to 39 age group as well as in the 60 to 69 age group. Usual epidemiologic risk factors were found in 20.1% of the cases. Hepatitis (61.9%) was a more common clinical presentation in our patients with Q fever than pneumonia (45.8%). This might reflect differences in strains of C. burnetii or the biology of the host. However, French farmers and stock breeders commonly drink unpasteurized raw milk from their cattle, which might indicate a relationship between hepatitis and infection via the digestive tract. CONCLUSION: Our results indicate that many cases of acute Q fever are undiagnosed. A greater awareness of the disease and more extensive serologic testing of patients with symptoms compatible with Q fever may improve the situation.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1992

Spotless boutonneuse fever.

Mediterranean spotted fever is endemic in southern France, especially during summer. Clinical diagnosis is generally based upon the presence of a febrile eruption with or without the typical tache noire. Usual laboratory findings, which include thrombocytopenia, elevated levels of hepatic enzymes, and hyponatremia, are not specific to the disease. The diagnosis may be confirmed serologically by obtaining specific western immunoblot results and by isolation of Rickettsia conorii from blood culture with use of the shell vial cell culture technique. We report here the first documented case of spotless boutonneuse fever.

Adult↗
PubMed1992

Acute and chronic Q fever in patients with cancer.

Q fever is caused by Coxiella burnetii, a strictly intracellular bacterium that lives within the phagolysosome of infected cells. We report here five cases of Q fever in patients with cancer. Three of them had a solid tumor, one had a B cell lymphoma, and one had chronic myeloid leukemia. One patient had acute Q fever, and the four others had chronic Q fever endocarditis. Two patients with endocarditis had no previous history of valvulopathy. C. burnetii was isolated from the valves of two patients. One of the patients with endocarditis died. Patients with cancer who have unexplained fever and live in areas in which C. burnetii is endemic should undergo serological testing for infection with this microorganism.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1992

Diagnosis of Mediterranean spotted fever by indirect immunofluorescence of Rickettsia conorii in circulating endothelial cells isolated with monoclonal antibody-coated immunomagnetic beads.

Rickettsia conorii, an obligate intracellular bacterium that infects vascular endothelial cells, is the etiologic agent of Mediterranean spotted fever (MSF). A new procedure using indirect immunofluorescence was used to directly detect R. conorii in circulating endothelial cells (CEC). CEC were separated from other blood components by using anti-endothelial cell monoclonal antibody-coated magnetic beads. An anti-R. conorii polyclonal rabbit antiserum was used to stain rickettsiae. The entire procedure took 3 h. R. conorii was detected in CEC from 9 of 12 patients ultimately confirmed as having MSF. Among the patients, 5 with R. conorii isolated by centrifugation-shell vial assay were also positive by the new technique. None of 3 patients whose diagnosis was other than MSF had R. conorii detected in CEC. The procedure may be helpful for rapid diagnosis of MSF and may lead to new technical approaches for the diagnosis of infectious diseases caused by intracellular pathogenic microorganisms.

Adult↗
PubMed1992

In vitro antibiotic susceptibility of the newly recognized agent of ehrlichiosis in humans, Ehrlichia chaffeensis.

Ehrlichiosis in humans, a rickettsial disease recently discovered in the United States, is generally treated successfully with tetracyclines; however treatment with these agents is usually avoided with children and pregnant women. The in vitro susceptibility of Ehrlichia chaffeensis, the agent of human ehrlichiosis in the United States, was assessed by a quantitative evaluation of infected DH82 cells cultivated in 96-well microtiter plates in the presence of different concentrations of selected antibiotics. Extracellular MICs and MBCs were evaluated after 72 h of exposure to the antibiotics. Doxycycline and rifampin were found to exert rapidly bactericidal effects, with MBCs in the extracellular culture medium of less than 0.5 and 0.125 microgram/ml, respectively. E. chaffeensis was resistant to chloramphenicol, ciprofloxacin, erythromycin, co-trimoxazole, penicillin, and gentamicin, which had MICs greater than 16, 4, 8, 4, 40, and 32 micrograms/ml, respectively. These observations are consistent with the finding that human ehrlichiosis appears to respond to tetracycline therapy, which has been the therapy of first choice. Further clinical investigations are necessary to evaluate the role of rifampin in the treatment of human ehrlichiosis, especially in children.

Anti-Bacterial Agents↗
PubMed1992

Antigenic characterization of ehrlichiae: protein immunoblotting of Ehrlichia canis, Ehrlichia sennetsu, and Ehrlichia risticii.

In recent years a febrile illness apparently associated with tick bite in patients in the United States has been attributed to infection by an Ehrlichia species. This implication is based on serologic responses to E. canis, morphologic demonstration of ehrlichiae in clinical materials, and a single isolate distinct from E. canis which was obtained from a human patient by the Centers for Disease Control. Little is known about the antigens of the ehrlichiae. This report expands the breadth of available knowledge concerning the antigenic components and serologic responses to component antigens of E. canis, E. sennetsu, and E. risticii. Protein immunoblotting after sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis by using density gradient-purified ehrlichiae and homologous antisera demonstrated reproducible and characteristic antigens within each species (for E. sennetsu, 91, 64, 54, 44, 36, 34, 28, 25, and 24 kDa; for E. risticii, 70, 52, 48, 44, 35, 28, 24, 23, and 20 kDa; for E. canis, 110, 64, 52, 42, 33, 28, 24, 23, and 20 kDa). When antisera were reacted with heterologous antigens, cross-reactivity among these species was virtually restricted to the 70-kDa antigen. Furthermore, when serum samples obtained from 10 patients who were convalescing from ehrlichiosis were tested against each antigen, only three serum samples had any reactivities, and these serum samples reacted with only a few of the antigenic bands. These results documented the molecular sizes of electrophoretically separated antigens of the three Ehrlichia species, confirm their serologic relationships, and support the novel nature of the agent(s) of human ehrlichiosis in the United States.

Animals↗
PubMed1992

[Current status of knowledge on the epidemiology of rickettsiosis in Africa].

Rickettsioses have been reported all over Africa. Serologic investigations have been driven using non specific methods as Giroud microagglutination and Weil-Felix test which led to numerous false positive. This explains the difficulties encountered in the evaluation of the prevalence of such diseases in Africa. However, three recent studies made in Tunisia, Central Africa and Zimbabwe show that seroprevalence of spotted fever group rickettsiae infections is close to 45% using MIF as reference method. New technics as Western and Line immunoblotting and RFLP PCR should allowed to new studies and revision of epidemiologic data on rickettsioses in Africa.

Africa↗
PubMed1991

Serological evaluation of Ehrlichia canis infections in military dogs in Africa and Reunion Island.

Sixty-eight dogs from four African countries and Reunion Island were tested for antibodies against Ehrlichia canis. Twenty-six dogs (50%) in Tunisia, Senegal and Chad were found positive using the indirect fluorescence antibody test. Dogs from both the Central African Republic and Reunion Island were all negative. Thus, this preliminary report confirms the presence of E. canis in Africa. Larger studies will be necessary to evaluate the current epidemiologic situation of canine ehrlichiosis in these countries.

Animals↗
PubMed1990

In vitro susceptibility of Ehrlichia sennetsu to antibiotics.

Antibiotic efficacies were evaluated by Diff-Quik (Dade, Düdingen, Federal Republic of Germany) staining of Ehrlichia sennetsu in P388D1 murine macrophages grown in 96-well microtiter plates. Sennetsu disease is generally cured with tetracyclines. In vivo, E. sennetsu is susceptible to doxycycline and is resistant to erythromycin, penicillin, and chloramphenicol. Our study confirmed, in vitro, the efficacy of doxycycline, which had an MIC of 0.125 micrograms/ml. E. sennetsu was found to be resistant to erythromycin, chloramphenicol, penicillin, gentamicin, and co-trimoxazole, while it was very susceptible to ciprofloxacin (MIC, 0.125 micrograms/ml) and rifampin (MIC, 0.5 micrograms/ml).

Animals↗
PubMed1990

[Articular manifestations of Giardia lamblia infections].

Reactive arthritis due to Giardia lamblia are rare. They are usually associated with abdominal pain and diarrhoea. Epidemiological data may help for the diagnosis which may be done by parasitologic studies of stools or microscopic examination of jejunal biopsy. Recovery is easily obtained with metronidazole.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Lack of co-transmission of Rickettsia conorii and Ehrlichia canis in human beings in the south of France.

Ehrlichia canis is the agent of canine Ehrlichiosis, commonly known as canine tropical pancytopenia. This canine disease is frequent in our area, as is Mediterranean Spotted Fever in humans. Recently a few cases of human Ehrlichiosis have been described in the USA. The supposed vector of both diseases is Rhipicephalus sanguineus. In order to evaluate the co-transmission of these two diseases, we selected 498 human sera positive for R. conorii and tested them for Ehrlichia canis. None of them were positive, suggesting the lack of co-transmission of the diseases.

Animals↗
PubMed1989

[Treatment of osteo-articular infections with ofloxacin. Preliminary study].

Twenty-three patients with osteoarthritis were treated by ofloxacin. Antibiotic association was used for 22 patients. Five patients have had osteomyelitis without foreign material. Four of them recovered. Seventeen patients carried foreign material. Evaluation are in progress for 5 of them. In the 12 remaining patients, 8 recovered at a mean duration follow-up of 6 months. One patient have had arthralgia that may be attributable to the treatment. The mean duration of treatment was 6 months for the foreign material group of patient, and 3 for the other.

Adolescent↗