An elderly woman has become the first reported case of infective endocarditis related to an infection on her cardiac device, which was caused by bacteria found on dogs’ claws, introduced through a puppy scratch.

The UK cardiologists who outlined the case are now warning other doctors to have a high index of suspicion for Capnocytophaga canimorsus (CCPC) — a bacterium almost exclusively found in the saliva and claws of cats and dogs — when patients present with an atypical infection and a recent animal injury.

The 76-year-old woman, who had a background of dilated cardiomyopathy and a cardiac resynchronisation device in situ, presented to the Kettering General Hospital with a six-week history of malaise, fever and night sweats, they wrote in BMJ Case Reports.

She had presented to the hospital on two previous occasions with similar symptoms and was initially diagnosed with a lower respiratory tract infection and then, two weeks later, food poisoning after she also developed bloody diarrhoea.