Hello and welcome to the Zero to Finals podcast.

My name is Tom and in this episode I'm going to be talking to you about meningitis.

And if you want to follow along with written notes on this topic, you can follow along at zero definals.com

or in the infectious diseases section of the Zero to Finals Medicine book.

So let's jump straight into it.

Meningitis means inflammation of the meninges,

and the meninges are that lining to the brain and the spinal cord

that contain the cerebro spinal fluid.

Inflammation is usually caused by a bacterial or a viral infection.

Nyseria meningitidus is a gram-negative diploccus bacteria. There's circular bacteria,

which is why we call them cocci, and they occur in pairs, which is why we call them diplococci.

Nyserianinidus is commonly known as meningoccus.

So if you hear somebody referring to meningococcus,

this is the same as Niceria meningoccal septicemia.

Meninjicoccal septicemia is when the meningoccal bacteria infects the bloodstream.

Septicemia is infection in the bloodstream,

and meningoccal is the bacteria.

The meningococcal bacteria is the cause of this classic non-blanching rash

that everybody worries about.

And this rash indicates the infection has caused something called

disseminated intravascular coagulopathy,

which is shortened to DIC,

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