Pneumonia due to Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas have distinct clinical manifestations which should be useful to the physician in making a differential diagnosis and determining therapy.
This observation derives from a study of gram-negative pneumonias by two Wayne State University investigators, James R. Tillotson, MD, and A. Martin Lerner, MD.
Pneumonia due to gram-negative organisms is an infrequently seen (up to 6% of reported cases) but often virulent form of the disease.
Since Friedlander's first report in 1882, pneumonia has been associated with such gram-negative genera as Klebsiella, Achromobacter, Brucella, Chromobacterium, Hemophilus, Neisseria, Pasteurella, Paracolobactrum, Proteus, Salmonella and Shigella, as well as Pseudomonas and Escherichia.
With the exception of Klebsiella and Hemophilus-caused respiratory diseases, little has been reported about the characteristics of gram-negative pneumonias.
To determine what, if any, distinct clinical manifestations were associated with the various other types of gram-negative pneumonias, Drs. Tillotson and Lerner undertook a study