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0:00
I'm Dr. Alan Johnson.
In this presentation, I'm
going to give an overview of
conventional and
automated methods of
anti-microbial susceptibility
testing methods,
commonly used in clinical
microbiology laboratories.
0:14
It is well documented
that patients
with serious
bacterial infections
who are treated with
antibiotics to which
the infecting pathogen
is not susceptible,
have poorer clinical outcomes
manifest by increased
morbidity and mortality.
In addition, such
patients frequently
have prolonged
lengths of hospital
stay with associated increase
in the costs of their
health care provision.
0:38
This slide shows a number
of such studies with
the percentage
mortality listed on
the horizontal axis,
and that you will see,
a reproducible finding from
all of the studies was,
in those patients who received
inappropriate therapy,
the degree of mortality
was statistically
significantly higher
than in those patients for whom
the therapy was appropriate.
1:00
Thus, anti-microbial
susceptibility testing is
an important part
of the management
of patients with infections.
At the level of the
individual patient,
results of susceptibility
testing can be
used to target and
guide the treatment.
At a general level
the accumulation of
susceptibility testing data in
individual laboratories
means that it is
possible to come up with
empirical guidelines for
the treatment of
further patients
based on the known
likely pathogens,
and their known levels
of resistance or
susceptibility to particular
antimicrobial agents.
1:31
The underlying rationale for
the laboratory testing of
antimicrobial agents is
to expose bacteria to
these antibiotics under
defined laboratory conditions,
and to determine
what effect, if any,
the presence of the
antibiotic has on
the growth and survival
of the organism.
