Teen’s suspected conjunctivitis was actually contagious meningococcal W disease

A VICTORIAN teen is lucky to be unscathed after a suspected case of conjunctivitis turned out to be meningococcal disease — a contagious infection capable of killing within hours.

A VICTORIAN teenager was lucky to have escaped unscathed after getting a suspected case of conjunctivitis turned out to be an eyeful of meningococcal disease — a contagious infection capable of killing within hours.

University student Lachlan Evans’s close call could have blinded him, or led to septicaemia or an infection in the lining of his brain.

Doctors say that though the meningococcal W strain is rare, its incidence in Australia is increasing, prompting several states, including Victoria, to introduce a special catch-up vaccination program for teens.

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Lachlan Evans, 19, thought he had something in his eye but in reality had meningococcal W — a bacterial infection that can be deadly within hours. Picture: David Caird

Mr Evans, 19, said his parents, both doctors, had encouraged him to go to Cabrini Hospital after he complained of a painful eye with a watery discharge.

Over several hours the pain in his eye grew progressively worse, until he could no longer keep the eye open.

Wesley Teoh, a final-year medical student from Monash Health’s School of Clinical Sciences, said: “Initially when we examined him we thought it was viral conjunctivitis, because it looked quite benign.

“But emergency physicians were quite worried because it came on quite quickly and he had very severe chemosis — swelling of the conjunctiva. So we took a swab of his eye.”

Mr Evans was sent home with eye drops, but got the shocking news days later.

Lachlan Evan’s experienced six hours of pain and watery discharge from his right eye. Picture: David Caird

“By that point the pain and irritation in my eye had completely gone away and I felt fine, so it was definitely a surprise to get a call telling me to come back into hospital because it was meningococcal disease W,” Mr Evans said.

“I was put on antibiotics and they took blood cultures and kept me under observation for several days.

“Looking back, I probably wasn’t as worried as I should have been.”

Mr Teoh said no one involved in treating Mr Evans had ever seen a case of the disease in an adult’s eye, and they could uncover only 30 such cases over three decades.

“The most common presentation of meningococcal disease W is where you get an infection of the blood,” he said.

Lachlan Evans ditched his contact lenses in favour of glasses after the infection. Picture: David Caird

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The case was so unusual it was written up in a medical journal to warn doctors that it could be a possible diagnosis.

National notifications for the W strain of meningococcal doubled from 17 in 2014 to 34 in 2015, and then nearly tripled to 100 in 2016. There have been 41 cases so far this year.

Victoria has introduced a free vaccine for high school students to protect them against meningococcal strains A, C, W and Y.

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