Deschutes County Health Services, working with the Oregon Health Authority and other partners, has issued a Health Alert Network advisory telling health care providers in Deschutes County and the surrounding Central Oregon communities that it is investigating a multistate outbreak of Salmonella Enteritidis infections.
The advisory does not name a source, a case count, or the other states involved. What it does do is ask clinicians to keep a sharp eye out for patients with gastrointestinal illness consistent with salmonellosis, and to collect the information investigators need to tie cases together and find a common exposure.
Providers are asked to get a food-exposure history covering the five days before illness onset, with particular attention to:
- Eggs and egg-containing foods, including fresh or locally sourced eggs;
- Raw, unpasteurized milk;
- Contact with animals such as chickens and baby chicks, lizards, snakes, and turtles; and
- Specific restaurant names, locations, and meal dates.
The county is also asking providers to consider stool testing for patients with diarrhea (sometimes bloody), fever, and abdominal cramps. Where a culture-independent test such as PCR comes back positive for Salmonella, the advisory stresses that a reflex culture or specimen submission must follow so public health labs can characterize the isolate. That step matters: without an isolate, there is no whole genome sequencing, and without sequencing, a sick person in Bend may never be linked to sick people in other states.
Suspected or confirmed cases should be reported to Deschutes County at 541-322-7418, Crook County at 541-447-5165, Jefferson County at 541-475-4456 (business hours) or 541-475-2201 (after hours), or the Oregon Health Authority at 971-673-1111.
