Bacterial meningitis is still an important topic for the infectious diseases specialist, due to it's high incidence, severity and it's high mortality rate.
Material and method: We retrospectively studied 679 patients diagnosed with community acquired bacterial meningitis in the Infectious Diseases Hospital Iaşi, Romania between 1998 and 2007.
Results: The annual number of admissions slightly decreased in the last years. Most patients were males (62.1%). Predisposing factors were present in 34.9% of cases. Seizures were described in 19.6% of cases, more frequent in children. The CSF was purulent only in 69.4% of patients, 29.6% of them receiving antibiotics prior to admission; the albumin level in the CSF of pneumococcal meningitis was higher than in other meningitis. The etiology was established in 51.6% of cases, more frequent in sucklings (68.1%). N. meningitidis was the most common cause of community acquired acute bacterial meningitis (CABM) (28.5%) followed by S. pneumoniae (14%). S. pneumoniae was susceptible to penicillin in 79% of cases. The mean mortality rate was 13.1%.
Conclusion: Factors associated with a poor prognosis were: pneumococcal etiology, age over 60, and the presence of seizures or coma at admission.