Corticosteroids in the treatment of severe nocardia pneumonia in chronic granulomatous disease

Abstract

Nocardia is 1 of the 5 main pathogens that infect chronic granulomatous disease patients. Despite aggressive antimicrobial therapy, medical treatment is not always successful and surgical resection of infected tissue has been intermittently required. We present 2 chronic granulomatous disease patients with severe Nocardia pneumonia whose pulmonary status worsened despite appropriate antimicrobials, but then improved clinically and radiographically with the addition of corticosteroids.