Symptoms:

• Chest pain
• May move (radiate) to the neck, shoulder, back, or abdomen
• Pain increases with breathing
• Sharp, stabbing
• Sitting up or standing relieves pain
• Chills
• Difficulty breathing
• Dry cough
• Fatigue
• Fever
• Splinting of ribs with deep breathing (bend over and hold chest when breathing)
• Sweating

Signs and tests:

Signs include:

• Faint or far away sounding heart sounds
• Rubbing sound heard when listening to the heart through a stethoscope
• Septic shock
• Signs of fluid in the pericardium (pericardial effusion)
• Signs of fluid in the space around the lungs (pleural effusion), such as decreased breath sounds
• Signs of pneumonia

Doctors may suspect pericarditis when one of the following tests shows an abnormal amount of fluid in the pericardial sac:

• Chest CT scan
• Chest MRI scan
• Chest x-ray
• Echocardiogram

This condition is diagnosed when the fluid around the pericardial sac is shown to be infected with bacteria. The following tests help doctors make this diagnosis:

• Blood cultures
• CBC showing increased WBC count
• Pericardial fluid culture
• Pericardial fluid gram stain