Campylobacter fetus infections in children.

There has been a gradual accumulation of reported Campylobacter fetus human infections since the first description in 1947. The taxonomy of these fastidious and morphologically confusing organisms has been recently revised and, in the past few years, through the use of selective culture medium for stool isolation C fetus has been implicated as a frequent paghogen in children. There are three relatively distinct patterns of human C fetus infection. The first, most frequent, pattern of disease is enteritis which is usually uncomplicated and due to C fetus subsp jejuni. A second form of disease consists of focal infections, often associated with vasculitis and/or chronic bacteremia. These infections, due to C fetus subsp intestinalis, are seen most often in older, debilitated, or chronically ill men. The third pattern, perinatal infections causing abortion, prematurity, and neonatal meningitis, is the least frequent, but these infections are usually fetal to the fetus or infant and are also due to C fetus subsp intestinalis.