Rothia mucilaginosa bacteremia in end-stage renal disease and solid organ transplant: The need for raised awareness

Rothia mucilaginosa, previously known as Stomatococcus mucilaginosus, is a Gram-positive coccus that is a part of the oropharyngeal and upper respiratory tract mi-crobiota. Although this organism is believed to be of low virulence, it is increasingly being recognized as an opportunistic pathogen mostly affecting immunocompromised hosts. In this article, we describe a case of Rothia mucilaginosa bacteremia in an immunocompro-mised heart transplant recipient with end-stage renal disease, who was getting maintenance hemodialysis via a tunneled catheter. To the best of our knowledge, no cases of Rothia mucilaginosa bacteremia have been reported previously in heart transplant patients.