Skip to content
actinomycosis
EntityQ422268· pop 34· linked from 300 articles

actinomycosis

Sign in to save

Also known as Actinomycotic madura foot (disorder), Actinomycotic mycetema, Actinomycotic mycetoma of foot, Madura foot due to Actinomadura (disorder), actinomycotic infection, actinomycetoma, boil, Madura foot due to Actinomadura

Actinomycosis is a rare and chronic infectious bacterial disease caused by the gram-positive Actinomyces species. The name refers to ray-like appearance of the organisms in the granules. About 70% of infections are due to either Actinomyces israelii or A. gerencseriae. Infection can also be caused by Streptomyces somaliensis and Propionibacterium propionicus. The condition is likely to be a polymicrobial anaerobic infection.

Key facts

Medical condition (new).image
Actinomycosis PHIL 2856 lores.jpg
Medical condition (new).caption
A man with actinomycosis on the right side of his face
Medical condition (new).field
Infectious disease

via Wikipedia infobox

Research

8,648 papers

via PubMed

Wikidata facts

Instance of
symptom or sign
Subclass of
disease
Image
Actinomycosis - Gram stain (5285453121).jpg
Show 11 more facts
NCI Thesaurus ID
C34350
health specialty
infectious diseases
drug or therapy used for treatment
benzylpenicillin
anatomical location
jaw
Commons category
Actinomycosis
ICD-9-CM
039.9
on focus list of Wikimedia project
WikiProject Medicine
symptoms and signs
fistula
medical examination
optical microscope
Sources (5)

via Wikidata · CC0

~5 min read

Encyclopedic overview

10 sections
Contents
  • Signs and symptoms
  • Causes
  • Diagnosis
  • Treatment
  • Epidemiology
  • History
  • Other animals
  • References
  • Further reading
  • External links

Actinomycosis is a rare and chronic infectious bacterial disease caused by the gram-positive Actinomyces species. The name refers to ray-like appearance of the organisms in the granules. About 70% of infections are due to either Actinomyces israelii or A. gerencseriae. Infection can also be caused by Streptomyces somaliensis and Propionibacterium propionicus. The condition is likely to be a polymicrobial anaerobic infection.

== Signs and symptoms == The disease is characterised by the formation of painful abscesses in the mouth, lungs, breast, or gastrointestinal tract. Actinomycosis abscesses grow larger as the disease progresses, often over months. In severe cases, they may penetrate the surrounding bone and muscle to the skin, where they break open and leak large amounts of pus, which often contains characteristic granules filled with progeny bacteria. These granules are often called "sulfur granules" due to their yellow appearance, although they may also be white, gray or brown.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “actinomycosis” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

Gallery (4)