Pillows - a hot bed of fungal spores
November 2005
Researchers in the North West Lung Centre at Wythenshawe Hospital have discovered millions of fungal spores right under our noses – in our pillows.
In the first study of its kind for nearly 70 years, the team was funded by the Fungal Research Trust to dissect feather and synthetic samples with 1.5 to 20 years of regular use. They identified several thousand spores of fungus per gram of used pillow - more than a million spores per pillow.
Professor Ashley Woodcock said: “We know that pillows are inhabited by the house dust mite which eats fungi, and one theory is that the fungi are in turn using the house dust mites’ faeces as a major source of nitrogen and nutrition (along with human skin scales). There could therefore be a ‘miniature ecosystem’ at work inside our pillows.”
Four to 16 different species were identified per sample, with higher numbers found in synthetic pillows. The most common, Aspergillus fumigatus, can cause the condition Aspergillosis in the lungs and sinuses which can spread to other organs such as the brain. It is very difficult to treat, has become the leading infectious cause of death in leukaemia and bone marrow transplant patients.
Immuno-compromised patients such as transplantation, AIDS and steroid treatment patients are also frequently affected with life-threatening Aspergillus pneumonia and sinusitis, and Aspergillus can also worsen asthma and cause allergic sinusitis.
Fungal varieties as diverse as bread and vine moulds and those usually found on damp walls and in showers were also found in the samples. Fortunately, hospital pillows have plastic covers and so are unlikely to cause problems, but patients being discharged home - where pillows may be old and fungus-infected - could be at risk of infection.
Professor Woodcock concluded, “Since patients spend a third of their life sleeping and breathing close to a potentially large and varied source of fungi, these findings certainly have important implications for patients with respiratory disease - especially asthma and sinusitis.”
