Endocarditis classification

Editor-In-Chief: C. Michael Gibson, M.S., M.D. [1] ; Associate Editor(s)-in-Chief: Maliha Shakil, M.D. [2]

Overview

Endocarditis may be classified based on the underlying pathophysiology of the process (infective vs. non-infective), the onset of the disease (acute vs. subacute or short incubation vs. long incubation), results of the cultures (culture-positive vs. culture-negative), the nature of the valve (native vs. prosthetic) and the valve affected (aortic, mitral, or tricuspid valve).

Classification

Endocarditis may be classified into 8 subtypes based on:^[1]^[2]^[3]


Classification criterion	Subgroups

Underlying pathophysiology	Infective endocarditis vs. non-infective endocarditis
Onset of the disease	Short incubation vs. long incubation
Culture result	Culture positive vs. culture negative
Nature of the valve	Native valve endocarditis vs. prosthetic valve endocarditis

References

Overview