Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 30, 2026

Bone Marrow Transplantation Platform to Investigate the Role of Dendritic Cells in Graft-versus-Host Disease
Published on: March 17, 2020
A fatal case of West Nile virus infection in a bone marrow transplant recipient
Bradley Hiatt1, Lucy DesJardin, Thomas Carter
1Division of Hematology, Oncology, Blood and Marrow Transplantation, Department of Internal Medicine, College of Medicine, and University of Iowa, Iowa City, USA.
Abstract:
West Nile virus (WNV) can cause severe, potentially fatal neurological illnesses, which include encephalitis, meningitis, Guillain-Barré syndrome, and anterior myelitis. Because of the short viremic phase, WNV infection is most commonly diagnosed by detection of immunoglobulin M antibody to WNV in serum or cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). We describe a patient with T cell lymphoma who had undergone a T cell-depleted bone marrow transplantation and developed fatal WNV infection. The results of serological tests of blood samples and of CSF tests were negative. Diagnosis was made postmortem by a positive result of reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (ABI 7700; TaqMan) for WNV in stored CSF and serum samples.
Related Concept Videos
Bone Marrow Sampling and Transplants
The transplant begins with high doses of chemotherapy and radiation treatment, which aim to destroy the...
Arboviral Encephalitis
Cryptococcal Meningitis
Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever
Rabies

