[Turicella otitidis, contributions to its role in the etiology of ear infections]

Abstract

Objective: Turicella otitidis is a gram-positive bacillus coryneforme described, after 16S RNA sequencing, in 1994 by Funke et al as a microorganism involved in otitis media, and it is in health conditions a habitual colonizer of the external auditory canal. Since its description, more than twenty years ago, few cases of otitis related to or directly attributed to this microorganism have been published.

Methods: Description of a case of mastoiditis that required surgery and other cases of otic pathology in which T. otitidis was isolated, in the second semester of 2017 in our institution. They were reported only when they grew in pure culture. The identification was made by mass spectrophotometry and an antibiogram was performed.

Results: In our institution in the second half of 2017, 5 cases of otitis media were documented, some of them complicated, in which T. otitidis was isolated. The most of patients were children with recurrent otic pathology, and in some cases the sample was taken before the administration of antibiotics.

Conclusions: Since the inclusion of new vaccines that protect against microorganisms typically causing otitis media, is possible there are a change in the etiology of this disease and that microorganisms anecdotally isolated until now have become protagonists. The improvement in the microbiological identification provided by tools such as mass spectrometry will help to clarify if there are or not a change in the etiology of these diseases.

Figura 1

Tomografía computarizada (plano axial) del Caso 1 que mostraba en el lado izquierdo un marcado aumento de las partes blandas en región occipitomastoidea con una colección adyacente de 1,7x0.5x1 cm, compatible con un absceso subperióstico (flecha)