Abstract
The application of molecular diagnostic methods may improve the timeliness and accuracy with which fungi are identified. A total of 76 well-characterized reference strains of clinically relevant Candida species and 61 clinical Candida isolates were tested by repetitive sequence PCR (rep-PCR) and PCR followed by electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (PCR/ESI-MS) and results compared against internal transcribed spacer (ITS) ribosomal RNA gene sequencing as a reference standard. Both rep-PCR and PCR/ESI-MS correctly identified 51 isolates to the species level. When method performance was evaluated based only on genospecies included in the reference libraries, both methods yielded an accuracy of 98.1%. It may be concluded that rep-PCR and PCR/ESI-MS are highly effective at identifying clinical isolates of Candida to the species level. These methods hold promise for improving the speed and accuracy of identification of Candida spp. in clinical mycology laboratories.
Acknowledgements
We thank Candace Gibson, Sheetal Bhatara, and Ginger Jamison for their technical support and Alicia Rodriguez for her assistance in the preparation of this manuscript. Thanks also to bioMérieux, Inc, Durham, NC (DiversiLab) for providing rep-PCR Kits and technical support. This work was supported in part by the American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities (ALSAC).
Declaration of interest: Thomas Hall and Mark Frinder are employees of Abbott Molecular. Randall Hayden has served as an advisory board member for Abbott Molecular. The other authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.
This paper was first published online on Early Online on 22 August 2011.