Whipple's endocarditis diagnosed non-invasively with plasma microbial cell-free DNA sequencing

Tropheryma whipplei bioprosthetic aortic valve endocarditis was diagnosed in a 55-year-old patient who presented with neurologic signs. Next-generation sequencing (NGS) of microbial cell-free DNA (cfDNA) detected a profound level of the organism in a plasma sample. This entity often comes to diagnosis only after histopathology and molecular diagnostic techniques are applied to infected heart valves in cases of culture-negative endocarditis. After 12 months of therapy, this patient has avoided valve replacement.