Abstract

A 25-year old woman, a contact lens user, presented to our cornea clinic with acute keratitis. Thorough microbiological evaluation by VITEK 2 led to the diagnosis of keratitis caused by contamination of contact lenses with Raoultella ornithinolytica. Raoultella ornithinolytica is an encapsulated Gram-negative, oxidase-negative, catalase-positive, aerobic, non-motile rod belonging to the Enterobacteriaceae family. The bacterium causes excessive production of histamine which breaks down the barrier integrity of corneal epithelial cells leading to keratoconjunctivitis. The patient was managed conservatively with fourth generation fluoroquinolones and is doing well. With this case we report a novel etiology for contact lens related keratitis, in the form of Raoultella species. A few cases of conjunctivitis caused by Raoultella species have been reported in literature. As per our knowledge, there is only one other published case of raoultella spp keratitis, and none from India.