SEPSIS PUERPERALIS CAUSED BY A GENOTYPICALLY PROVEN CAT-DERIVED PASTEURELLA-MULTOCIDA STRAIN

We report a disseminated intrauterine Pasteurella multocida infection in a puerperal woman who could not remember any traumatic exposure to her cat. An oral swab taken from the cat; just 2 days after the patien t's admission, grew Pasteurella multocida, with an PCR-fingerprinting pattern identical to the patient's isolate. Hand-washing after every c ontact with cats and dogs and if feasible separation of in-house pets from mother and infant should be applied to prevent this uncommon but serious occurrence of post-partum infections. To our knowledge this is the first case of Pasteurella multocida 'child-bed fever', with a gen otypically identical strain isolated from the in-house cat. (C) 1998 E lsevier Science Ireland Ltd.