Affiliations: Department of Clinical Microbiology, Bnai Zion Medical
Center, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel | Department of Pediatrics, Bnai Zion Medical Center,
Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel | Ruth and Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine,
Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel | Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery,
Bnai Zion Medical Center, Technion, Israel – Institute of Technology, Haifa,
Israel | Department of Radiology, Bnai Zion Medical Center,
Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel
Note: [] Correspondence: Dr. Elena Segal, B.Sc., Ruth and Bruce
Rappaport Faculty of Medicine, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology,
Haifa, Israel. Tel.: +972 528 648947; Fax: +972 4 8535969; E-mail: selenas1710@yahoo.com
Abstract: Non-typable Haemophilus influenzae (NTHi) is emerging as an
important cause of invasive disease in immunized children. We describe a
healthy, fully immunized 4-year old child who presented with bacteremia due to
NTHi without overt acute otitis media (AOM), and subsequently developed severe
mastoiditis complicated by sigmoid sinus thrombosis. Although, mastoiditis is
typically regarded as a complication of AOM, those cases without antecedent AOM
may represent an entirely different pathophysiological process with NTHi
bacteremia seeding the mastoid. We present another example of the potential
invasiveness of NTHi with a temporal sequence of events whereby NTHi bacteremia
seeds the mastoid. This may represent novel sequelae of NTHi infection.
