Salmonella - what is it? Salmonellosis: symptoms, treatment

Salmonellosis is a disease of an infectious nature that is caused by bacteria and is characterized by intoxication and damage, mainly of the stomach and intestines.

Causes

The bacterium belongs to the rod-shaped Gram-negative bacteria of the Salmonella genus, the Enterobacteria family (Salmonella, Shigella). The microbe is resistant to the environment. In the water it survives up to six months, in the soil up to eighteen months. Salmonella is common in meat and milk. What is it - oversight, poor-quality storage or processing - is not important. The infectious principle is not only preserved, but also capable of reproduction. The taste of products and the appearance does not change. Smoking, salting, freezing of food does not lead to the death of an infectious disease.

The source of the disease is a sick person or a carrier of bacteria, as well as poultry and animals. Infection can occur with the use of meat obtained from an infected animal (sheep, pigs, cattle, geese, ducks, chickens), contaminated milk and eggs. Salmonella in eggs is the most common cause of infection. Sometimes the pathogen can be transmitted through household items, food, water in the reservoirs, if there was contact with a sick person or animal. The disease is noted in many countries of the world. It is more common in the warm season in large metropolitan areas. Elderly people and children are more susceptible to it because of low resistance to the causative agent of the disease.

Development of the disease

Once in the stomach with the intestine, the bacterium Salmonella reaches the small intestine, where it is captured by the cells of the epithelium and penetrates the mucous membrane. This is where it multiplies, which causes inflammatory changes in the mucosa, and the bacteria spreads further into the blood and lymph nodes. As the obsolete Salmonella died, there is a constant intoxication of the body. Violated microcirculation of blood, transportation of ions, which leads to a sharp release of water and electrolytes into the lumen of the intestine from the cells.

Symptomatics

The incubation period ranges from six hours to eight days. At this time the agent does not show itself in any way. Then the disease comes into full rights, like salmonella, the symptoms appear the following: the temperature, dizziness, weakness, headache, chills rise sharply. The patient grumbles and swells up his stomach, pains in him, appetite decreases, a loose stool (maybe with an admixture of mucus and fetid), vomiting, nausea.

A doctor examining the patient in which Salmonella has settled symptoms will reveal the following symptoms: lowering blood pressure, increasing heart rate, dehydrating the body (skin elasticity is reduced, mucous membranes are pale and dry, the amount of urine decreases, thirst, hoarseness, some muscles can shrink convulsively) , The spleen and liver are enlarged, the skin and sclera are icteric.

Sometimes the disease can take a severe septic form, when secondary purulent foci begin to form in various organs (in the liver, soft meninges, lymph nodes, gall bladder, aorta, lungs, endocardium, joints, bones).

Complications, most commonly found in this disease - infectious-toxic shock, hypovolemic shock, acute renal failure.

Bacteriophage

This form of the disease is characterized by the fact that no clinical manifestations in humans are observed, but salmonella (photo) is found in serological and bacteriological studies. All bacterial carriers can be divided into such categories: acute carriage, chronic and transient.

Acute is observed among the reconstructive species and is characterized by the release of the microbe from the host organism for a period of fifteen days to three months.

Chronic carriage is implied when Salmonella is excreted for more than three months. That it is she, confirms compulsory observation for six months and a re-examination of duodenal contents, urine, feces.

Transient bacterial carry-over implies the absence of clinical signs at the time of the examination and the previous three months, and bacteriological tests yielded positive results one to two times with an interval of one day with negative results in the subsequent.

Diagnostics

Find out what kind of disease is involved, you can by collecting epidemiological data (salmonella in eggs and other foods, the group nature of the disease). The laboratory receives confirmation by resorting to specific methods of research.

Bacteriological study. From the washing water of the stomach, urine, blood, bile, vomit, feces, salmonella is allocated. What is it is - and confirms the study.

The indirect hemagglutination reaction, the agglutination reaction, the complement fixation reaction, is determined by the antibody titer to the pathogen in the blood serum.

Of the non-specific methods of laboratory diagnosis, a general blood test is used.

Differential diagnostics

To distinguish this infection is from escherichiosis and dysentery, typhoid and cholera, food poisoning by poisons of animal or plant origin, inorganic and organic substances, appendicitis and myocardial infarction.

Therapy

Once salmonella is isolated, the treatment should be as follows: the stomach is washed with two, three liters of water or a 2% solution of sodium hydrogencarbonate. The patient is assigned a diet, which includes food, sparing the gastrointestinal tract both mechanically and chemically. When Salmonella is found, treatment involves the mandatory restoration of fluid levels in the body and the number of electrolytes.

With mild illness and dehydration, rehydration is performed orally (through the mouth) with preparations "Gastrolit", "Regidron", "Citroglukosalan" and other electrolyte solutions. You can use a sugar-and-salt solution, which is prepared by adding to the one liter of boiled water eight teaspoons of sugar and two teaspoons of table salt. The total volume of fluid for replenishment should be equal to the volume of lost liquid with feces and water.

If the disease and / or dehydration take a severe form, then they resort to intravenous administration of polyionic solutions (Ringerlactate, Chlolol, Acesol, Trisol, Quartasol). The solution is administered at a certain rate and in a certain volume, which depends on the degree of fluid loss and the level of dehydration of the body.

To destroy the pathogen itself, one of several antibacterial drugs is used: "Ofloxacin", "Norfloxacin", "Ciprofloxacin", "Ceftriaxone".

To reduce the degree of intoxication of the body, resort to the help of enterosorbents: Polysorb, Polyphepan, Enterosorb, Enterodez.

To restore the electrolyte balance, disturbed by the disease, drugs "Bismuth subsalicylate", "Sandostatin", "Imodium", "Acetylsalicylic acid", "Indometacin"

Also, the patient must take drugs that increase the nonspecific resistance of the body and restore the normal intestinal microflora (eubiotic bacterial agents, vitamins, antioxidants). The patient can be discharged after complete clinical recovery and confirmation by a bacteriological study of the absence of a pathogen in the feces.

Prevention

Preventive maintenance of disease consists in obligatory veterinary-sanitary control over slaughter of a bird and cattle, observance of all rules and technologies on processing of carcasses, correct transportation, storage, realization of food stuffs. There is a vaccine, which includes inactivated salmonella. That this prevents the disease of birds and pets is known to everyone. Survey of employees of children's institutions and food enterprises also helps prevent disease.