Borrelia crocidurae Meningoencephalitis, West Africa - Vol. 19 No. 2 - February 2013 - Emerging Infectious Disease journal - CDC

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Borrelia crocidurae Meningoencephalitis, West Africa - Vol. 19 No. 2 - February 2013 - Emerging Infectious Disease journal - CDC

Georges de La Tour (1593‒1652) La Femme à la puce (The Flea Catcher) (1638) Oil on canvas (90 cm × 120 cm) Musée Lorrain, Nancy. Photo P. Mignot

 

 

Volume 19, Number 2—February 2013

Dispatch

Borrelia crocidurae Meningoencephalitis, West Africa

Article Contents

• The Study


• Conclusions


• Acknowledgment


• References


• Table


• Suggested Citation

Sandrine Goutier¹ , Elisabeth Ferquel¹, Claudine Pinel, Annick Bosseray, Bruno Hoen, Gérard Couetdic, Amina Bourahoui, Claire Lapostolle, Hervé Pelloux, Martine Garnier, Natacha Sertour, Isabelle Pelloux, Patricia Pavese, and Muriel Cornet

Author affiliations: Author affiliations: Grenoble Teaching Hospital, Grenoble, France (S. Goutier, C. Pinel, A. Bosseray, H. Pelloux, I. Pelloux, P. Pavese, M. Cornet); Pasteur Institute, Paris, France (E. Ferquel, M. Garnier, N. Sertour), Joseph Fourier University, Grenoble (C. Pinel, H. Pelloux, M. Cornet); Besançon Teaching Hospital, Besançon, France (B. Hoen, G. Couetdic); Argenteuil Hospital, Argenteuil, France (A. Bourahoui); Laennec Hospital, Quimper, France (C. Lapostolle)

Suggested citation for this article

Abstract

Borrelia crocidurae–associated relapsing fever is endemic to West Africa and is considered benign. We report 4 patients with B. crocidurae–associated neurologic symptoms; 2 of their cases had been misdiagnosed. Frequency and severity of this disease could be underestimated; molecular methods and serodiagnostic tests for Lyme disease might be helpful in its detection.

Tick-borne relapsing fever (TBRF) is caused by several Borrelia species that are transmitted through the bites of Ornithodoros ticks (1). TBRF is an acute febrile illness characterized by multiple recurrences of nonspecific signs and symptoms, including fever, headache, myalgia, and arthralgia. Neurologic complications might occur, particularly related to B. hispanica, B. crocidurae, B. duttoni, and B. turicatae infections (2–7). Conventional diagnosis is made by microscopic detection of spirochetes in blood samples collected during acute febrile episodes and by direct examination of the cerebral spinal fluid (CSF) of patients with neurologic manifestations. Recently, molecular methods have been shown to be more reliable for Borrelia spp. detection in blood and CSF (3,8). B. crocidurae is endemic to West Africa; in Senegal, the rising incidence of infections reported recently has been associated with climate change (1,9). We report 3 cases of meningitis and 2 cases of encephalitis in 4 persons among a total of 11 consecutive travelers who returned from West Africa to France with B. crocidurae infections.