Australasian Collaboration in Endocarditis - ACE

Eugene Athan

Director of the Barwon South West Public Health Unit. Professor of Infectious Disease at School of Medicine Deakin University

Dylan Bartholomeusz

Nuclear Medicine Physician and Gastroenterologist. Royal Adelaide Hospital. Head Nuclear Medicione, SA Medical Imaging.

Jayme Bennetts

Director of Cardiothoracic Surgery at Monash Health and Victorian Heart Hospital.

Julie Bradley

Senior Cardiologist and Clinical Lead of Cardiovascular Imaging, Royal Adelaide Hospital.

Alicia Chan

Cardiologist. Central Adelaide Local Health Network. SA.

Sharon Chen

Infectious Diseases Physician Westmead (NSW)

Microbiologist ICPMR New South Wales Pathology

Kathryn Colebourne

General Medical and Stroke Physician, The Prince Charles Hospital, Chermside

Ash Hardikar

Cardio-thoracic surgeon, Royal Adelaide Hospital.

Robert Horvath

Infectious Diseases Physician, The Prince Charles Hospital. Microbiologist, Pathology Queensland.

Siong Hui

Infectious Disease Physician. Fiona Stanley Hospital and Charles Gairdner Hospital, Perth WA.

Alison Keed

Infectious Diseases Physician, Royal Perth Hospital

Joshua Mahadevan

Neurologist and Stroke Physician.

Central Adelaide Local Health Network and Victorian Stroke Telemedicine.

Lachlan Marshall

Cardio-thoracic Surgeon, The Priince Charles Hospital.

Mbakise (Pula) Matebele

Intensivist, The Prince Charles Hospital, Brisbane.

Hugh McGann

Infectious Diseases Physician. Waikato, Heath New Zealand

Renjy Nelson

Infectious Diseases Physician. The Queen Elizabeth Hospital and Royal Adelaide Hospital. SA.

Veronica Playle

Infectious Diseases Physician and Microbiologist, Middlemore Hospital, Auckland NZ.

Chris Robson

Infectious Diseases Physician. Victorian Heart Hospital, Monash Health. 

Indy Sandaradura

Infectious Diseases Physician Westmead (NSW)

Microbiologist ICPMR New South Wales Pathology

John Sedgwick

Cardiologist, The Prince Charles Hospital.

Mitra Shirazi

Cardiologist, Royal Adelaide Hospital.

Emily Tucker

Infectious Diseases Physician, Royal Adelaide and Queen Elizabeth Hospitals.

Kanthi Vemuri

Infectious Diseases Physician, The Prince Charles Hospital, Brisbane.

Livia Williams

MBBS (hons), BMedSci (hons), EMBA, FRACS (Cardiothoracic Surgery)

Cardiothoracic Surgeon/Senior Staff Specialist the Prince Charles Hospital

Simon Briggs

Infectious Diseases and General Physician, Auckland City Hospital,Te Toka Tumai

Teddy Teo 

MBBS, BmedSCi (hons), FRACP

Infectious Diseases Physician, Flinders Medical Centre , SA.

Nicholas Anagnostou

Infectious diseases physician, Flinders Medical Centre, SA

Shu Tan

Infectious Diseases Physician, Royal Perth Hospital, WA

Tan Ban Hock

Infectious Diseases Physician, Singapore General Hospital

Ying Ying Chua

Infectious Diseases Physician, Singapore General Hospital

Chee Loon Leong

Infectious Diseases Phyician, Hospital Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Geetha Kandavello

Paediatric Cardiologist, National Heart Centre,Malaysia

 Endocarditis outcomes have only marginally improved since the 1980s, with a mortality rate of approximately 20%.

According to the ABS, in 2021 161 Australians had endocarditis listed on their death certificates.

Using 20% mortality rate as estimate, there are approximately 800 cases of IE diagnosed annually currently.

This compares to 2011 when 99 were certified.

This apparent increase in incidence is greater than the Australian population increase over the same period,which is part of a global phenomenon  thought largely due to an increase of “IE risk populations”

There is a need to improve outcomes further as ~ 20% is a high mortality rate when compared to other infective conditions. ACE’s aim is to improve these outcomes (with an aspiration goal of “single-digit mortality rates”). As IE is such a complex condition with multiple variables, this process will be gradual and require significant levels of collaborations to achieve statistically meaningful results. It is unlikely any single Australian State would be able to provide these numbers, so a multi-centre multi-state collaboration appears the realistic way forward. Australia and NZ together have a population that will soon reach 30 million. In comparison, Scandinavia with it’s world-leading registries has a combined population of ~ 25 million.

Part of the efforts to improve outcomes includes registries which are not only for subtle management assessments but also to detect changes in epidemiology and to enable benchmarking and comparison between centres.

ACE also hopes to not only standardize outcomes in IE between centres, but also to improve awareness (both in the medical world and to the general public) of this disease, to aid in possible prevention (Q fever an example of this) but also early detection (greater recognition of when to suspect it, collect blood cultures etc) and to improve management (including access to TOEs other imaging modalities and  CTS).

IE is one of the most complex conditions, requiring the input and co-ordination of multi specialties to maximize outcomes. ACE promotes the use of MDTs for “complex” cases.

In terms of research and management, IE is a subset of sepsis which is a WHO priority. Improvements in IE may be extrapolated to potentially improvements in other sepsis cases.

The various ACE projects will de described in their individual sections.

ID-Micro section of Steering Committee.

Eugene Athan, Sharon Chen, Robert Horvath (chair), Siong Hui, Alison Keed, Hugh McGann,  Renjy Nelson, Veronica Playle, Chris Robson, Indy Sandaradura, Emily Tucker,and Kanthi Vemuri.

Cardiology section of Steering Committee.

John Sedgwick, Alicia Chan, Julie Bradley, Mitra Shirazi.

Cardiothoracic Surgery (CTS) section of Steering Committee

Jayme Bennetts, Livia Williams, Lachlan Marshall, Ash Hardikar

Stroke medicine section of Steering Committee

Kathryn Colebourne, Joshua Mahadevan.

ICU section of Steering Committee

Mbakise (Pula) Matebele

Nuclear-imaging section of steering committee

Dylan Bartholomeusz

Other Sections TBA.

ACE proposes a national registry to improve outcomes, not only by comparing specific organisms or therapeutics but also by enabling benchmarking between centres. Access to CTS and TOE in some centres may be a barrier to best outcomes, and this would enable comparisons to be made to improve logistics.

This would be a voluntary registry, expected to largely encompass centres that have IDPs. Data fields required would be dependant on logistics. Centres where a single physician is responsible for their registry would only be expected to fill in “essential data fields”. Larger centres with possibly MDT data collection would have extra data fields to provide additional information.

Progress of this will be detailed on the dedicated web-page (“click here”).

To improve collaborations and have points of contact between participating centres (and also those with specific interests in IE such as academics) we have a members list displayed (“click here”).

For POET-2 Click here.

Improving patient/clinician information.

The information sheets displayed on the ieQ website will be ammended for ACE.

Client/consumer representatives will soon be appointed.

Other projects will be listed as develop.

Newsletters posted here:

Newsletter 1 (PDF, 89.7 KB)

Newsletter 2 (PDF, 115.2 KB)

Newsletter 3 (PDF, 126.3 KB)

The symbolism of the provisional ACE icon is an open antibiotic capsule in the shape of a heart,  to represent both cardiovascular infections and medical therapy of the same.

The colour represents both blood (endocarditis is the ultimate blood-stream infection) and the red soil of Australia.

The first week of March was a huge week for ACE.

We thank RCPA update for an endocarditis MDT session which was well received.

The conference was also an opportunity for participation in Royal Adelaide Hospital's (RAH's) endocarditis MDT.

RAH's MDT is state-of the art, a credit to our South Australian members!

RCPA has been a fantastic endorser of ACE!

The conference also marked the debut of the ACE banner, which hopefully will de displayed at a few locations this year.

June 2024

ACE had a major presence at ISCVID (including having the 2nd largest number of abstracts submitted -host nation Sweden held 1st place)

International speakers for the upcoming ACE IE symposium in October were recruited.

We also thank ISCVID for giving us the opportunity to advertise the symposium (and ACE) at the conference.

August 2024

TPCH was priviledged to host a visit by Carlos Mestres who witnessed one of our EAT (IE MDT sessions)

October 2024

Awesome month for ACE!

Endorsement by both CSANZ and ANZ Stroke Organisation (thank you!)

1st ACE affiliated publication

ACE Symposium

Selection of symposium and networking dinner photos

Photos and news to follow shortly!

Final 2024 ACE IE Symposium booklet

March 2025

21st March, inaugural ACE Journal Club

Attendance approximately 50 (virtual and in room ). 

Fantastic start!

Will be monthly from May

New section below on presentations/topics

27th March

Flyers for 2026 ACE IE symposium released!

The 2nd ACE endocarditis symposium will be in a larger venue, the historic University of Queensland Medical School in Herston,

to reflect ACE's increasing membership and expansion into Asia.

2023

August

CSANZ Adelaide

2024

March

RCPA Update. Adelaide.

June

ISCVID. Malmo

October

ACE Hybrid endocarditis symposium, Brisbane.

21st March 2025

Inaugural session.

Multibacillary (including candida) endocarditis

Presented by Pula Matebele and  Olly Hayes

Bacillius cereus IE 

presented by Drew Comeau

TBA