Background: The most characteristic finding in non typhoid Salmonella serotype infection is acute gastroenteritis which is usually benign and self-limiting. However, more serious extraintestinal findings, such as bacteraemia and focal infections localized to any organ may appear.
Patients and methods: The objective of this article is to describe the most important characteristics of the extraintestinal infections due to non typhoid Salmonella serotypes observed in our hospital between December 1991 and August 1999. To do so, we reviewed the clinical histories of patients in which extraintestinal non typhoid Salmonella serotypes was isolated, applying a clinicomicrobiological protocol.
Results: Salmonella enterica was isolated on 1,543 occasions, of which 25 (1.6%) were Salmonella serotype Typhi and 1,518 (98.3%) non typhoid serotypes. Of the patients with non typhoid serotypes infections, 27 had extraintestinal infection (1.8%). The most frequently isolated was the serotype typhimurium (50% of cases) followed by enteritidis (26% of cases) and hadar (7.1% of cases). Regarding the clinical picture, bacteraemias secondary to gastroenteritis and focal infections occurred with the same frequency (35.7%); the remaining were primary bacteraemias. Eight patients were under 10 years of age and 15 patients were over 60. In 57.1% of the patients there was underlying disease.
Conclusions: Extraintestinal non typhoid Salmonella serotypes infections make up 1.8% of all salmonellosis and most of them occur in childhood or in the elderly. Transitory bacteraemias in the context of acute gastroenteritis occur mainly in children. The greatest risk of acquiring focal infections is associated with the existence of underlying illness or immunodepression.