Age, comorbid factors, precipitating events, weight, symptoms and signs, microbiologic factors, radiographs, surgical therapy, and morbidity were correlated.
Teams of international and Kosovar public health personnel collaborated in field and laboratory investigations of epidemiologic, environmental, and microbiologic factors.
Epidemiologic, immunologic, and microbiologic factors associated with severe outcome are not fully defined.
The microbiologic factors were O group and the absence or presence of each of the eae, stx1, stx2, and ehxA genes.
Imported cases of Shigella infections have been reported in developed countries following travel to a foreign or developing country [ 4, 5] and may be impacted by factors including socio-economic factors [ 6], food distribution networks [ 5] and microbiologic factors [ 7].
However, the behavioral and microbiologic factors leading to transmission of serogroup C meningococcal disease among MSM are still not understood and require attention as additional epidemiologic data are collected and analyzed.
Multivariable analysis of patient, clinical, and microbiologic factors associated with development of STSS identified age to be a strong predictor for STSS; risk for STSS was 5-fold greater for persons 15 44 years of age (odds ratio [OR] 5.42, 95% CI 2.22 13.23, p<0.001) than for the reference group (children <15 years of age).
(Additional file 1) None of the other demographic, clinical or microbiologic factors listed in Tables 1 and 2 (e.g. neutropenia, mucositis, glycopeptide treatment) were found to be additional risk factors.
We drew separate conclusions, more preliminary because evidence was sparse, about associations between specific health outcomes and specific quantitatively assessed microbiologic factors.
