Abstract

Aeromonas veronii causes Aeromonas meningitis, a rare and fatal condition among immunocompromised adult patients. Aeromonas veronii is a gram-negative, facultative anaerobic, non-spore-forming bacillus bacteria under the family Aeromonadaceae, and it has several characteristics with the Enterobacteriaceae family. Both freshwater and marine habitats have large populations of this bacterium. Although they have been separated more frequently during warmer months, Aeromonas species may grow in various temperatures. Warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals, such as fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and humans, are susceptible to a variety of illness syndromes caused by Aeromonas species. The Department of Microbiology at Shyrian Private Hospital in Duhok City received a cerebrospinal fluid specimen from a hospitalized immunosuppressed 23-year-old girl with meningitis. Aeromonas veronii was isolated from culturing of cerebrospinal fluid samples on the MacConkey agar, blood agar, and chocolate agar. Then the isolate was identified by using VITEK System 2. The antibiotic susceptibility test used the classical disc diffusion method and the VITEK System 2. It showed that this bacterium was susceptible to these antibiotics: azithromycin, azatreonam, ceftriaxone, cefotaxime, ciprofloxacin, gentamycin, levofloxacin, and trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole and resistant to ampicillin, ampicillin+ clavulanic acid, colistin, and meropenem. This case report is the first reported case of the isolation of Aeromonas veronii from CSF in Iraq and Duhok City. It also found that this bacterium can cause fatal infections such as meningitis rather than gastrointestinal infections in adult immunocompromised hospitalized patients. An antibiotic susceptibility test found this bacterium to be sensitive and resistant to multiple antibiotics, which means that the treatment of meningitis needs the antibiotic sensitivity test