Ruptured mycotic aneurysm of a coronary artery. A fatal complication of Salmonella infection.

A 53-year-old man with a kidney transplant was hospitalized because of back pain, fever, and an enlarging heart size. Cultures of blood and stool yielded Salmonella enteritidis (group D, serotype enteritidis). Despite appropriate antibiotic therapy, the patient died of cardiac arrest on the seventh hospital day. Autopsy revealed a ruptured mycotic aneurysm of the right coronary artery with hemopericardium. In addition, a ruptured aneurysm of the abdominal aorta was present. To our knowledge, ruptured mycotic aneurysm involving a coronary artery owing to Salmonella infection has not been described previously.