First case of gastrointestinal mucormycosis in an immunocompromised patient with gallbladder and duodenum involvement

Excerpt

Mucormycosis is an infection caused by fungi from the Mucorales group. The first case of mucormycosis was described by Paltauf in 1885. It occurs mostly, but not exclusively, in immunodeficient patients. The most frequent predisposing affections are: hematological or solid malignancies, neutropenia, use of corticosteroids, solid organ or stem cell transplant, diabetic or metabolic acidosis, iron overload or deferoxamine use, and malnourishment [1]. The most commonly affected organs include, from the most to less frequent: brain and sinuses, lungs, skin, gastrointestinal (GI) tract, and miscellaneous [2]. Due to the lack of specific clinical symptoms and often altered states, early diagnosis is rarely obtained, leading to a high mortality rate. GI mucormycosis is a rare disease, often diagnosed post-mortem, usually associated with such symptoms as GI bleeding, abdominal pain and distension, and nausea and vomiting. We report the case of a patient with acute leukemia, who developed GI mucormycosis with gallbladder and suspected duodenal involvement. Extensive research was performed in the PubMed, Embase, and Ovid libraries, using the keywords mucormycosis, zygomycosis, gastrointestinal mucormycosis, necrotizing cholecystitis, peritonitis. No occurrence of mucormycosis with gallbladder or duodenal involvement was found. …