Health Dictionary
Reliable, easy-to-read patient information on common medical conditions — written in plain language, free of jargon, and grounded in current evidence. Browse the most frequent diagnoses, understand what they mean for everyday life, and learn which steps and questions help you have a focused conversation with your doctor.
Pyemia
Introduction
Pyaemia (or pyemia) is a type of septicaemia that leads to widespread abscesses and is usually caused by the staphylococcus bacteria. Apart from the distinctive abscesses, pyaemia exhibits the same symptoms as other forms of septicaemia. It was almost universally fatal before the introduction of antibiotics.
Sir William Osler included a three-page discussion of pyaemia in his textbook The Principles and Practice of Medicine, published in 1892. He defined pyaemia as follows:
“A general disease, characterized by recurring chills and intermittent fever and the formation of abscesses in various parts, all of which result from the contamination of the blood by products arising from a focus contaminated by the bacteria of suppuration.”
Earlier still, Ignaz Semmelweis included a section entitled “Childbed fever is a variety of pyaemia” in his treatise, The Etiology of Childbed Fever (1861). Jane Grey Swisshelm, in her autobiography entitled Half a Century, describes the treatment of pyaemia in 1862 during the American Civil War.
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