INTRODUCTION
Brucellosis is endemic in Saudi Arabia especially in areas where the local people herd many types of cattle(mainly goats, sheep, camels and cows) Patients acquire the disease by drinking raw milk, eating raw meat or the direct contact with these animals (1-3). It causes a chronic febrile disease with many manifestations.
Hematological abnormalities such as anemia, leucopenia and leukocytosis are commonly encountered in affected individuals (4-6).Rarely pancytopenia and disseminate intravascular coagulation are seen. Isolated Brucella – induced thrombocytopenia has been reported mainly in adult affected patients (7, 8). It is extremely rare in children. We present here severe Brucella-induced thrombocytopenia in a child thought to have idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP). Once the diagnosis of brucellosis was established and specific treatment (antibiotic combination) was started, the platelets count showed prompt response to this. We advice clinicians in areas where brucellosis is endemic to consider this possibility in children presenting with febrile illnesses and thrombocytopenia.
Manuscripts that are Published Ahead of Print have been peer reviewed and accepted for publication by the Editorial Board of the West Indian Medical Journal. They may appear in their original format and may not be copy edited or formatted in the style guide of this Journal. While accepted manuscripts are not yet assigned a volume, issue or page numbers, they can be cited using the DOI and date of e-publication. See our Instructions for Authors on how to properly cite manuscripts at this stage. The contents of the manuscript may change before it is published in its final form. Manuscripts in this section will be removed once they have been issued to a volume and issue, but will still retain the DOI and date of e-publication.
Our 7 faculties and 12 professional schools offer more than 200 programmes to some 18,000 graduate, undergraduate and continuing studies students.
The UWI, Mona ranks first in Jamaica among accredited tertiary-level programmes. In 2012, the University was again one of Jamaica’s Top 100 Employers.
