Liver abscess after endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography with presence of Actinomyces naeslundii

A 60-Year Literature Review on Hepatic Actinomycosis

Hepatic actinomycosis (HA) is a rare infection with an indolent course, atypical clinical manifestations, nonspecific laboratory and imaging findings, and challenging diagnosis. We describe a case of a 35-year-old female who developed HA 2 weeks after gastrectomy. In addition, we analyzed clinical characteristics and outcome of 157 additional cases of HA identified in a 60-year literature review. Patients with HA were predominantly male (57%) and more than one-half were between 40 and 70 years of age. The infection was cryptogenic in 80.8% of cases. Risk factors for HA were identified in 63.1% of the patients. Clinical presentation included fever (57.7%), abdominal pain (52.1%), weight loss (45.1%), anorexia (27.5%), fatigue and chills (12.7% each), and malaise (12%) over a 2.35 ± 3.5 months period. Leukocytosis, elevated alkaline phosphatase, erythrocyte sedimentation rate, and C-reactive protein were the most frequent laboratory findings. Radiologic imaging revealed that the right lobe was more frequently affected (62.5%) with a single lesion found in two-thirds of cases. Diagnosis was achieved by histopathologic examination in 70.6% of cases. Cultures yielded Actinomyces in 45 instances, with A. israelii being the most frequent species. Less than one-half of the patients were treated only with antibiotics, while the others received combined medical and surgical treatment. The median duration of antibiotic therapy was 135 days. The presence of multiple lesions or solid tumor-like lesions (without liquefaction) was significantly associated with medical therapy alone. The outcome was favorable in most cases (94%). Although rarely encountered, HA should be considered in patients with a chronic or subacute inflammatory process of the liver to promptly diagnose and treat.

A systematic review of case reports of hepatic actinomycosis

Background

Hepatic Actinomycosis (HA) is one of the infections that causes disorders in patients when diagnosed untimely and inappropriately.

Methods

Case reports on HA in patients published between 2000 and April 2020 were gathered by carrying out a structured search through PubMed/Medline.

Results

Through a survey of the Medline database, 130 studies were identified and then, 64 cases with HA were included in the final analysis. Asia had the largest share of cases with 37.5% (24 reports), followed by Europe and the Americas. Affected patients were predominantly males (64%) and the overall mortality rate was 1% with only one male patient in his 50 s dying. Nearly all patients (92%) were immunocompetent. However, in four patients, the use of immunosuppressive medication led to depression of the immune system. Most of the patients (80%) experienced complications. In terms of the complications, the most frequent ones were previous history of abdominal surgery (32%) and foreign bodies in the abdominopelvic region (20%). Actinomyces israelii was the most common pathogen isolated from patients. Abdominal pain (66%), fever (62%), weight loss (48%), night sweat, malaise, and anorexia (14%) over about 3.1 months were the most frequently reported clinical symptoms. Extension to one or more surrounding organs was evident in 18 patients (28%). Histopathologic examination confirmed infection in 67% of the patients and samples obtained from liver puncture biopsy (32%) were most frequently used in diagnosis. Surgery or puncture drainage + anti-infection was the most common method to treat patients and penicillin, Amoxicillin, Doxycycline, and ampicillin were the most frequently used drugs to control infection.

Conclusion

HA should be considered in patients with a subacute or chronic inflammatory process of the liver. With accurate and timely diagnosis of infection, extensive surgery can be prevented.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13023-021-01821-5.

Risk of pyogenic liver abscess and endoscopic sphincterotomy: a population-based cohort study

OBJECTIVES

To evaluate the risk of pyogenic liver abscess (PLA) in patients receiving endoscopic sphincterotomy (ES).

SETTING

A population-based cohort study using data from Taiwans' National Health Insurance Research Database was conducted. Patients aged 20 or older who had undergone an ES were considered as the ES cohort. The dates for the first hospitalisation of the patients receiving ES were defined as the index dates.

PARTICIPANTS

Patients in the ES and non-ES cohorts were selected by 1:1 matching ratio based on a propensity score. A total of 8174 sex-matched, age-matched and index year-matched (1:1) pairs of patients receiving ES and 8174 patients without ES served as controls. Cox proportional hazards regression was employed to calculate the HRs and 95% CIs for the association between PLA and ES.

RESULTS

The overall incidence of PLA was significantly higher in the ES cohort than in the non-ES cohort (4.20 vs 0.94, respectively, per 1000 person-year) with the adjusted HR (aHR) 4.50 (95% CI 3.38 to 6.58) A stratified analysis during the follow-up years revealed that when the ES cohort was compared with the non-ES cohort, they displayed a higher risk of PLA during the first follow-up year (aHR 4.35, 95% CI 2.26 to 8.39) which continued significantly over the next 4-5 years of follow-up.

CONCLUSIONS

Patients receiving ES are associated with having a higher risk of PLA.