A microbe first identified in fermenting soy sauce and long regarded as low risk has infected a man's natural heart valve, in what doctors in Spain describe as the first documented case of its kind.
The patient, a 67-year-old man, needed open-heart surgery to replace his mitral valve after a growth of bacteria more than 2 centimeters long formed on it. Physicians from Pontevedra University Hospital Complex and University Hospital 12 de Octubre in Madrid reported the case in June 2026 in JACC: Case Reports, under the title "Native Valve Infective Endocarditis Caused by Staphylococcus condimenti: First Case Reported."