<i>Bartonella henselae</i> , <i>Babesia odocoilei</i> and <i>Babesia divergens</i> -like MO-1 infection in the brain of a child with seizures, mycotoxin exposure and suspected Rasmussen's encephalitis
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Background In conjunction with more sensitive culture and molecular diagnostic testing modalities, simultaneous or sequential infection with more than 1 vector borne zoonotic pathogen is being increasingly documented in human patients. On a frequent basis, many people are exposed to apparently healthy, but infected, domestic and wild animals, the arthropod vectors with which these animals have co-evolved, and the bacterial, protozoal and other pathogens for which various animals are reservoirs. Unsuspected zoonotic transmission by scratch, bite, or vector exposures can result in chronic, indolent, or potentially life-threatening infections. Methods In December 2016, at 2 years of age, a male child residing in Ontario, Canada received facial scratches from a feral cat. In August 2018, seizures began 8 days after the child developed a focal, suspected insect bite rash. In June 2019, potential mold toxicity in the child’s bedroom was assessed by fungal culture and urinary mycotoxin assays. Beginning in January 2022, Bartonella spp. serology (indirect fluorescent antibody assays), polymerase chain reaction (PCR) amplification, DNA sequencing, and enrichment blood and brain cultures were used on a research basis to assess Bartonella spp. bloodstream and central nervous system (brain biopsy) infection. In 2024, using recently developed PCR and DNA sequencing targets, Babesia species infection was retrospectively assessed due to the rash observed in 2018. Results Although there was historical cat and suspected tick exposures, serological testing for Bartonella henselae and Borrelia burgdorferi were repeatedly negative. Sequential neurodiagnostic testing partially supported a diagnosis of Rasmussen’s encephalitis. Astrogliosis was the only brain biopsy histopathological abnormality. Bartonella henselae DNA was amplified and sequenced from enrichment cultures of brain tissue. Retrospectively, Babesia odocoilei and Babesia divergens -like MO-1 infections were confirmed by amplification and sequencing of DNA extracted from enrichment blood cultures processed in January 2022, from blood and brain tissue cultures in June 2022, and blood in January and June 2023. Conclusions Infection with B . henselae , B . odocoilei , and B . divergens -like MO-1, complicated by mycotoxin exposure, created a complex clinical scenario for this child, his parents, and his doctors.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame distilled prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.
Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one teacher head, not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".