Why having dogs and cats can be dangerous- a must read!
Having gone through two months and two weeks of medical school, I am proud to present to you the microbiology I have to study for this thurs' exam.
Some gram negative bacteria notable for its animal relations:
Dog-owners watch out!
Pasteurella Multocida
One time, I went to Ralph's Ices (a popular Italian Ice stand in Staten Island) to buy some of my favorite Spumoni ice. There was a guy standing in the corner, ice in one hand, leash with Fluffy on the other. He surreptitiously looked around at other people before he quickly squatted down so that Fluffy could lick his ice, and then immediately stood up again to continue EATING HIS OWN ice!! This is really gross and non-hygenic (I don't follow that pets=family=people BS). We better hope that the dude isn't an alcoholic and that dear Fluffy doesn't bite his Ralph's Ice-loving butt.
Pasteurella Multocida normally lives in the saliva of Fluffy the puppy or your lovable Mr. Mittens. Once Mr. Mittens bites your skin, Pasteurella Multocida will enter the affected area, causing cellulitis (not cellulite, but general infection of the skin). If the person happens to have cirrhosis (liver disease, commonly from being a chronic alcoholic) or a compromised immune system, the Pasteurella can cause arthritis or osteomyelitis ( infection and break down of your bones).
Other things to note: even though it's gram-negative, the little brutes won't show up on MacConkey agar, the gel that shows whether gram negative bacteria can ferment lactose. It also can have plasmids that code genes for Beta lactamase protein to fight against pencillin, a common beta-lactam that causes bacterial cell walls to lyse during the last stage of binary fission. The best way to fight this infection is to administer a combo of penicillin and beta-lactamase inhibitor so that the beta lactamase is stopped and penicillin can do its job.
Bunny lovers and hunters watch out! Like... SNOW WHITE
Francisella Tularensis
My friend Frances looks like a bunny. Maybe they named this after her.
Disney portrays Snow White as this forest-creature loving princess who let all the animals hang out at her house. I don't like Disney not only for giving girls unrealistic portrayals of what to expect in relationships (waiting forever for a prince to come?!) but for promoting the interactions of people with woodland creatures.
Woodland critters like gophers, bunnies, squirrels, and beavers can be infected with Francisella Tularensis. If the critter happens to be bleeding and mildly even grazes your skin... or even your shirt, there is a big chance you can become infected with this bacteria. A hunter put a bloody rabbit in a pouch, next to his hip... and a few days later, that entire pelvic area was red and inflamed.
It's called rabbit fever for a reason: makes you feverish, blood shot eyes, and bloodshot skin...
Francisella requires cysteine for growth and was one of the seven biological weapons that the US decided to make... i think back in 1969.
Unsterilized Milk and Meat lovers beware!
Brucella bacteria causes Brucellosis, an infection of waves of fevers, neurological complications, and osteomyelitis (that bone breakdown thing again). A classic mark will be its Temperature-Pulse deficit; when a ridiculously high fever is accompanied by a low pulse (normally both should be high or low together). Interesting bits about this bacteria-- it GROWS when blue light shines on it!!! Also, Hilary Clinton, as first lady went to Mongolia, where she graciously accepted fermented milk.... just in case someone over there was trying to poison the first lady, her personal physician piled antibiotics on her when he found out.
BEWARE OF EVIL KITTENS
CAT SCRATCH DISEASE (meow)
Bartonella causes Cat-Scratch Disease. Kittens can often have bartonella traveling through their blood. Kittens also eventually go to that development stage when they like play-fighting and biting so that they learn how to be ferocious tamed housecats later on in their life. A week after a cat scratch/bite, you might notice... tender swollen lymph nodes (along with backaches, fever, etc). This is necrotizing lymphadentitis. Those bartonella buggers are making your lymph nodes die. In even worse scenarios, you can get endocarditis, which is infection of your heart valves. The problem is... bartonella is very sneaky. It might be in your heart valves, but if it's swabbed on a blood culture dish, it will not show up! Sneaky bastards.
Don't worry though, you can use ciproflaxcin, or other quinolones to stop it (given your lymph nodes haven't all necrotized already).
BTW Ciproflaxcin is used almost for everything not beaten down with penicillin or other beta lactams... this is bc quinolones use an entirely diff mechanism for shutting bacteria down. It is a DNA gyrase inhibitor; DNA gyrase is a prokaryotic topoisomerase II, used to relax negative and positive supercoils during bacterial DNA replication... Now the scary part is that if there is a super bacteria that comes along that is resistant to quinolones and hands out its secret to other bacteria-- we're totally screwed!
Some gram negative bacteria notable for its animal relations:
Dog-owners watch out!
Pasteurella Multocida
One time, I went to Ralph's Ices (a popular Italian Ice stand in Staten Island) to buy some of my favorite Spumoni ice. There was a guy standing in the corner, ice in one hand, leash with Fluffy on the other. He surreptitiously looked around at other people before he quickly squatted down so that Fluffy could lick his ice, and then immediately stood up again to continue EATING HIS OWN ice!! This is really gross and non-hygenic (I don't follow that pets=family=people BS). We better hope that the dude isn't an alcoholic and that dear Fluffy doesn't bite his Ralph's Ice-loving butt.
Pasteurella Multocida normally lives in the saliva of Fluffy the puppy or your lovable Mr. Mittens. Once Mr. Mittens bites your skin, Pasteurella Multocida will enter the affected area, causing cellulitis (not cellulite, but general infection of the skin). If the person happens to have cirrhosis (liver disease, commonly from being a chronic alcoholic) or a compromised immune system, the Pasteurella can cause arthritis or osteomyelitis ( infection and break down of your bones).
Other things to note: even though it's gram-negative, the little brutes won't show up on MacConkey agar, the gel that shows whether gram negative bacteria can ferment lactose. It also can have plasmids that code genes for Beta lactamase protein to fight against pencillin, a common beta-lactam that causes bacterial cell walls to lyse during the last stage of binary fission. The best way to fight this infection is to administer a combo of penicillin and beta-lactamase inhibitor so that the beta lactamase is stopped and penicillin can do its job.
Bunny lovers and hunters watch out! Like... SNOW WHITE
Francisella Tularensis
My friend Frances looks like a bunny. Maybe they named this after her.
Disney portrays Snow White as this forest-creature loving princess who let all the animals hang out at her house. I don't like Disney not only for giving girls unrealistic portrayals of what to expect in relationships (waiting forever for a prince to come?!) but for promoting the interactions of people with woodland creatures.
Woodland critters like gophers, bunnies, squirrels, and beavers can be infected with Francisella Tularensis. If the critter happens to be bleeding and mildly even grazes your skin... or even your shirt, there is a big chance you can become infected with this bacteria. A hunter put a bloody rabbit in a pouch, next to his hip... and a few days later, that entire pelvic area was red and inflamed.
It's called rabbit fever for a reason: makes you feverish, blood shot eyes, and bloodshot skin...
Francisella requires cysteine for growth and was one of the seven biological weapons that the US decided to make... i think back in 1969.
Unsterilized Milk and Meat lovers beware!
Brucella bacteria causes Brucellosis, an infection of waves of fevers, neurological complications, and osteomyelitis (that bone breakdown thing again). A classic mark will be its Temperature-Pulse deficit; when a ridiculously high fever is accompanied by a low pulse (normally both should be high or low together). Interesting bits about this bacteria-- it GROWS when blue light shines on it!!! Also, Hilary Clinton, as first lady went to Mongolia, where she graciously accepted fermented milk.... just in case someone over there was trying to poison the first lady, her personal physician piled antibiotics on her when he found out.
BEWARE OF EVIL KITTENS
CAT SCRATCH DISEASE (meow)
Bartonella causes Cat-Scratch Disease. Kittens can often have bartonella traveling through their blood. Kittens also eventually go to that development stage when they like play-fighting and biting so that they learn how to be ferocious tamed housecats later on in their life. A week after a cat scratch/bite, you might notice... tender swollen lymph nodes (along with backaches, fever, etc). This is necrotizing lymphadentitis. Those bartonella buggers are making your lymph nodes die. In even worse scenarios, you can get endocarditis, which is infection of your heart valves. The problem is... bartonella is very sneaky. It might be in your heart valves, but if it's swabbed on a blood culture dish, it will not show up! Sneaky bastards.
Don't worry though, you can use ciproflaxcin, or other quinolones to stop it (given your lymph nodes haven't all necrotized already).
BTW Ciproflaxcin is used almost for everything not beaten down with penicillin or other beta lactams... this is bc quinolones use an entirely diff mechanism for shutting bacteria down. It is a DNA gyrase inhibitor; DNA gyrase is a prokaryotic topoisomerase II, used to relax negative and positive supercoils during bacterial DNA replication... Now the scary part is that if there is a super bacteria that comes along that is resistant to quinolones and hands out its secret to other bacteria-- we're totally screwed!