Alternative Names
H. influenzae meningitis; H. flu meningitis
Symptoms:
- Irritability, poor feeding in infants
- Fever (in young infants the temperature may actually be below normal)
- Severe headache (older children)
- Nausea and vomiting
- Stiff neck or pain in neck when flexed
- Pain in back when neck is flexed forward and chin brought toward chest (older children)
- Unusual body positions
- Sensitivity to light
Signs and tests:
For any patient with meningitis, it is important to perform a lumbar puncture (spinal tap), where a spinal fluid (known as cerebrospinal fluid, or CSF) is collected for testing.
Other signs and tests include:
- Bulging of the fontanelles (the soft spots on an infant's head)
- Opisthotonos (lying with the back arched, head, back, and chin up)
- Seizures
- Poor circulation(blood flow through the body)
- Mental status changes (such as irritability, reduced consciousness, coma)
- High white blood cell count in blood
- Spinal fluid showing increased number of white blood cells
- Spinal fluid culture showing bacteria
- Serology (antibodies in blood) showing recent exposure to H. influenzae
- Blood culture growing H. influenzae