Diagnostic Microbiology Development Program

Streptococcus suisis an emerging pathogen which causes a variety of infections in humans, meningitis is the most common. Although the organism is sensitive to penicillin and can be used to treat meningitis, hearing loss is seen in over 60% of treated meningitis cases at discharge from the hospital. The microbiology laboratory in the Takeo Provincial Hospital has isolated Strep. suis from 14 patients with meningitis. All of these isolates have been MLST typed by the NAMRU 2 laboratory in Phnom Penh. All are the same MLST type and match the most common type seen in Vietnam. Although infections with this bacteria have been reported extensively from Vietnam and Thailand, they have not before been reported from Cambodia. The organism is common in pigs, hence the name, and infection in humans may result from handling contaminated pork. Angelo Caon provided this Gram stain image of the Gram positive cocci in a spinal fluid of a patient with meningitis.

A literature review Streptococcus suis: An emerging pathogen by H.F.L. Wertheim et al can be found in Clinical Infectious Diseases (2009) 48(5):617-625