Melioidosis

An infectious illness, also called Whitmore's disease, that is most frequent in Southeast Asia and Northern Australia and is caused by a bacteria called "Pseudomonas pseudomallei" found in soil, rice paddies and stagnant waters. Humans catch the disease by inhalation of contaminated dust or when soil contaminated by the bacteria comes in contact with abraded (scraped) skin. Melioidosis most commonly involves the lungs where the infection can form a cavity of pus (abscess). The bacteria can also spread from the skin through the bloodstream the brain, eyes, heart, liver, kidneys, and joints. The common symptoms of melioidosis are not specific. They include headaches, fever, chills, cough, chest pain, and loss of appetite. Melioidosis can also cause encephalitis (brain inflammation) with seizures (convulsions). The diagnosis is by a microscopic evaluation of a sputum (spit) sample in the laboratory. A blood test may detect early acute cases of melioidosis. The treatment of melioidosis involves antibiotics and depends on the location of the disease: Mild illness: Antibiotics such as chloramphenicol, doxycycline, sulfisoxazole, or trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole. More severe illness: A combination of chloramphenicol, doxycycline, and co-trimoxazole. Very severe illness (as with persistent blood infection): Intravenous antibiotics including chloramphenicol. If sputum cultures remain positive for 6 months: Surgical removal of the lung abscess with lobectomy is considered. Antibiotic treatments may be necessary from 3 to 12 months. Melioidosis can remain latent (in hiding) for years and emerge when a person's resistance is low. The alternative name for melioidosis is, as mentioned, Whitmore's disease. This is in honor of Major Alfred Whitmore (1876-1946), an English surgeon in India.

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An infectious disease of rodents in India and Southeast Asia that is caused by Pseudomonas pseudomallei and is communicable to humans. The characteristic lesion is a small caseous nodule, found generally throughout the body, which breaks down into an abscess; symptoms vary according to the tracts or organs involved. SYN: pseudoglanders, Whitmore disease. [G. melis, a distemper of asses, + eidos, resemblance, + -osis, condition]

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mel·i·oi·do·sis .mel-ē-.ȯi-'dō-səs n, pl -do·ses -.sēz a highly fatal bacterial disease closely related to glanders that occurs primarily in rodents of southeastern Asia but is readily transmitted to other mammals including humans by the rat flea or under certain conditions by dissemination in air of the causative bacterium of the genus Pseudomonas (P. pseudomallei)

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n.

a disease of wild rodents caused by the bacterium Pseudomonas pseudomallei. It can be transmitted to humans, possibly by rat fleas, causing pneumonia, multiple abscesses, and septicaemia. It is often fatal.

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me·li·oi·do·sis (me″le-oi-doґsis) [Gr. mēlis a distemper of asses + -oid + -osis] an infection, usually of rodents, which can spread to other animals and is caused by Burkholderia pseudomallei. Most cases are seen in Southeast Asia, but it has also been seen in temperate regions. Human disease, usually acquired through contamination of a break in the skin with soil or water, may range from a dormant infection to localized abscesses, benign pneumonia, or fatal septicemia; late activation of inapparent disease or recrudescence of previous symptoms may also occur. In other animals the syndrome varies considerably and usually involves caseous or suppurative lesions of the lymph nodes or viscera. Called also pseudoglanders.