Evaluation of analytical characteristics of blood culture and accelerated identification of microorganisms in bloodstream infections

Bloodstream infections still remain an urgent problem in many areas of medicine. Laboratory diagnosis of septic conditions is based on the microbiological examination of blood using automatic culture systems. Therefore, from the point of view of equipping a modern microbiological laboratory, it is important to evaluate the convergence of the laboratory data obtained when using certain hematological cultivators. An important factor is the timeliness of the appointment of etiotropic therapy, which depends on the time of issuance of a microbiological identification of the species of the microorganism isolated from the blood. This study assessed the convergence of data obtained using two hematological cultivators «Bact|ALERT 3D 60» and «Juno LABSTAR 100», and also described the main characteristics of the preanalytical stage of the accelerated microbiological identification method. It was found that the convergence of the results of hemocultivators is acceptable and identical microorganisms are detected in 98.6% of cases. Accelerated identification is also possible with the use of the described method using any of the devices included in the study. In addition, it was found that the preferred material for mass spectrometry is the sediment of microbial cells, for it yields a higher identification success rate.