Changing populations: The elderly injection drug users, health-care associated endocarditis and immunocompromised patients

Abstract

The epidemiology of infective endocarditis is changing. The combination of increased life-expectancy, the burden of chronic disease, immunosuppression as a result of improving treatment and prognosis of malignancies and transplantation and the increasing device-related and iatrogenic infections have resulted in risk factors for infectious endocarditis. The etiological agents vary according to the underlying predisposing factors with increases in resistant health-care associated infections among the special populations reviewed in this chapter.