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Purpose: Nocardiosis is a life-threatening infectious disease. We aimed at describing nocardiosis in patients with primary immunodeficiency diseases (PID)., Methods: This international retrospective cohort included patients with PID and nocardiosis diagnosed and/or published from Jan 1, 2000, to Dec 31, 2016. To identify nocardiosis cases, we analyzed PID databases from the French National Reference Center for PID (Paris, France) and the National Institute of Health (NIH, United States of America) and we performed a literature review on PubMed., Results: Forty-nine cases of nocardiosis associated with PID were included: median age at diagnosis of nocardiosis was 19 (0-56) years and most cases were observed among chronic granulomatous disease (CGD) patients (87.8%). Median time from symptoms to diagnosis of Nocardia infection was 20 (2-257) days. Most frequent clinical nocardiosis presentation was pneumonia (86.7%). Twelve-month mortality rate was 4.2%, and 11.9% of patients experienced a possible recurrence of infection. Nocardiosis more frequently led to the diagnosis of PID among non-CGD patients than in CGD patients. Non-CGD patients experienced more cerebral nocardiosis and more disseminated infections, but mortality and recurrence rates were similar. Highest incidences of nocardiosis among PID cohorts were observed among CGD patients (0.0057 and 0.0044 cases/patient-year in the USA and in France, respectively), followed by IL-12p40 deficiency., Conclusions: Among 49 cases of nocardiosis associated with PID, most patients had CGD and lung involvement. Both mortality and recurrence rates were low.

The usefulness of single-enzyme amplified-fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analysis for the subtyping of Mycobacterium kansasii type I isolates was evaluated. This simplified technique classified 253 type I strains into 12 distinct clusters. The discriminating power of this technique was high, and the technique easily distinguished between the epidemiologically unrelated control strains and our clinical isolates. Overall, the technique was relatively rapid and technically simple, yet it gave reproducible and discriminatory results. This technique provides a powerful typing tool which may be helpful in solving many questions concerning the reservoirs, pathogenicities, and modes of transmission of these isolates.

A PCR assay for the diagnosis of infection produced by Candida sp. was developed. The primers, designated 520 and 522, were selected from highly-conserved areas of the small subunit (ssu) 18S rRNA gene of Candida spp. To check the value of the results a Candida albicans oligonucleotide probe, digoxigenin-labeled, and a general Candida probe were used in hybridization experiments with the amplified products. We were able to detect a Candida- specific fragment of 1800 bp from different clinical samples. The procedure described could provide an interesting complement to present diagnostic methods of detecting Candida sp in clinical samples.

Serratia rubidaea biotype 1 was isolated from the bile and blood of a patient with a bile tract carcinoma obstructing the common bile duct and who underwent invasive procedures. The infection was cleared after adequate treatment with antibiotics.