Curtobacterium oceansedimentum Infective Endocarditis: A Plant-Associated Pathogen Causing Acute Heart Failure From Severe Valvular Dysfunction

Culture-negative infective endocarditis (IE) poses significant diagnostic challenges, most commonly attributable to antibiotic exposure or fastidious organisms beyond the detection capacity of standard microbiological methods. We report a 53-year-old man with polysubstance use disorder who presented with secondary cardiogenic shock from severe valvular dysfunction. He was found, on tissue culture, to have Curtobacterium oceansedimentum IE—a plant-associated pathogen with no reported cases of IE in the literature to our knowledge. This case establishes Curtobacterium as a causative pathogen of human systemic infection and expands the differential diagnosis of culture-negative endocarditis, particularly among patients with high-risk exposure histories.