GC: n
S: WHO – http://www.who.int/zoonoses/resources/qfever/en/ (last access: 8 December 2014); CDC – Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. http://www.cdc.gov/qfever/ (last access: 18 November 2014).
N: 1. fever (n): from late Old English fefor, fefer, “fever, temperature of the body higher than normal”. From Latin febris, related to fovere “to warm, heat,”.
feversih: late 14c, “causing fever”.
Q: The Q in Q fever stands for either query (unknown etiology) or Queensland, Australia (the site of discovery), depending on which historian you choose to believe.
2. Q fever was first recognised in Australia during the 1930’s when workers at a Brisbane meat processor became ill with a fever. As the cause of the illness was unknown, the workers were diagnosed with ‘Query’ fever, eventually abbreviated to Q fever.
3. An acute generally self-limited infection caused by Coxiella burnetii, characterized by fever, chills, headaches, myalgia, malaise and occasionally rash. Sometimes it is complicated by mild pneumonia, hepatitis and endocarditis.
4. In humans it is usually acquired by inhalation of airbone organisms in dust or aerosols, infected by contaminated domestic animals with no vector involved in transmission.
5. Q fever should be suspected in any patient who through occupation or residence comes in contact with livestock or their by-products such as wool or hides.
6. The use of pneumorickettosiosis as synonym of Q fever is right because this fever is due to Coxiella burnetii, a Rickettsia also named Rickettsia burnetii. However, this synonym is wrong if other Rickettsia, different from Rickettsia burnetii, produces pulmonary disorders.
7. In the United States, nine-mile fever was the name formerly given to Q fever in mice and laboratory workers.
S: 1. OED. http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=fever&allowed_in_frame=0 (last access: 18 November 2014); GDT: 2. AQFR – http://www.qfever.org/aboutqfever.php (last access: 18 November 2014). 3 & 4. DORLAND p. 693. 5, 6 & 7. GDT.
SYN: Australian Q fever, nine-mile fever.
S: DORLAND p. 693.
