Disseminated Hormographiella aspergillata Infection with Lung and Brain Involvement after Allogenic Hematopoietic Stem-Cell Transplantation in a 54-Year-Old Man

Abstract

AbstractHormographiella is a rare fungal pathogen in humans; however, case reports have described disseminated infection in immunocompromised hosts. This pathogen has been described to yield poor prognosis in patients who harbor it. Herein, we present a case report of autopsy-proven disseminated Hormographiella aspergillata infection, confirmed by DNA sequencing, in a patient experiencing a relapse of leukemia.This 54-year-old Caucasian man with chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) that had been diagnosed in 1989, after having received a hematopoietic cell allotransplant from a compatible sibling donor, had B-cell lymphoid-blast phase of CML in April of 2013, with multiple relapses. His most recent relapse was in September of 2016, when bone marrow biopsy showed 90% blasts. The results of bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) cultures were positive for filamentous fungus infection. The patient developed encephalopathy and worsening respiratory statusand tachycardia with flutter and hypotension, which resulted in his death.At autopsy, bilateral pleural effusions, multiple right pleural nodules, and subarachnoid hemorrhage were noted. Angioinvasive hyphal fungi were found in the right frontal lobe of the brain and the right upper lobe of the lung. Morphologically, the fungi had multiseptate, branching hyphae. The bronchoalveolar lavage specimen grew a fungus for which the colony morphologic characteristics and microscopic features were compatible with a Hormographiella species. H. aspergillata from the bronchoalveolar lavage was further identified by sequencing the D2 hypervariable region of the large-subunit (LSU) ribosomal DNA gene and the full internal transcribed spacer (ITS) regions.