Postpartum Septic Sacroiliitis: a Case Report

Abstract

In this report we presented a patient with post-partum sacroiliitis. Pyogenic sacroiliitis occurs infrequently during the peripartum period. Pyogenic sacroiliitis often presents unilaterally, but it can also occur bilaterally. It is usually accompanied with pain in the buttocks. A 28-year-old female patient gave birth to her fourth child through vaginal delivery. Eight days postpartum, she had pyrexia, sweating, coxalgia and low back pain. On admission she had tenderness in the left hip and sacral area with a body temperature of 38.5 °C, a total white cell count of 21.800/mm3, a C-reactive protein level of 120 mg/dl (N: 0-5), and an erythrocyte sedimentation rate of 40 mm/h. She was found negative for brucellosis. The patient who had been hospitalized in the infection disease clinic due to high fever on the postpartum eighth day was transferred to Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation/Rheumatology clinic because of hip and low back pain on the postpartum twentieth day. Sacroiliac magnetic resonance imaging examination was consistent with left sacroiliitis and fluid collection in left psoas muscle. She responded positively to the treatment, obviating any need to artrosynthesis.