Gene/Protein
Disease
Symptom
Drug
Enzyme
Compound
Pivot Concepts:
Gene/Protein
Disease
Symptom
Drug
Enzyme
Compound
Target Concepts:
Gene/Protein
Disease
Symptom
Drug
Enzyme
Compound
Query: UMLS:C0085437 (
bacterial meningitis
)
4,038
document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)
Bacterial meningitis
is a medical emergency requiring highly bactericidal antibiotics to achieve cure. Many challenges exist to achieving optimal patient outcome. First, antibiotics must pass the blood brain barrier. Once in the subarachnoid space, achieving bactericidal therapy involves circumventing antibiotic resistance and, more commonly, antibiotic tolerance arising from the slow growth of bacteria in the nutrient poor cerebrospinal fluid. Finally, bactericidal therapy is most often bacteriolytic, and debris from lysis is highly inflammatory. Controlling damage from lytic products may require adjunctive therapy to prevent neuronal death. These challenges are an extreme example of the different requirements for treating infections in different body sites.
ACS
Infect Dis 2019 12 13
PMID:Acute Bacterial Meningitis: Challenges to Better Antibiotic Therapy. 3126 83
The most distressing aspect of
bacterial meningitis
is limited improvement in the mortality and morbidity despite attributable advances in antimicrobial chemotherapy and supportive care. A major contributing factor to such mortality and morbidity is our incomplete understanding of the pathogenesis of this disease. Microbial penetration of the blood-brain barrier, a prerequisite for the development of
bacterial meningitis
, exploits specific host and bacterial factors as well as host cell signaling molecules. Determination and characterization of such host and bacterial factors have been instrumental for developing our current knowledge on the pathogenesis of
bacterial meningitis
. In addition, counteracting such host and microbial factors has been shown to be efficacious in the prevention of
bacterial meningitis
. Antimicrobial therapy alone has limited efficacy in improving the outcome of
bacterial meningitis
. Recent studies suggest that counteracting targets contributing to bacterial penetration of the blood-brain barrier are a beneficial therapeutic adjunct to antimicrobial therapy in improving the outcome of
bacterial meningitis
. Taken together, these findings indicate that the elucidation of host and bacterial factors contributing to microbial penetration of the blood-brain barrier provides a novel strategy for investigating the pathogenesis, prevention, and therapy of
bacterial meningitis
.
ACS
Infect Dis 2020 01 10
PMID:Investigating Bacterial Penetration of the Blood-Brain Barrier for the Pathogenesis, Prevention, and Therapy of Bacterial Meningitis. 3180 29
