A COMPARISON OF SUSCEPTIBILITY TO 5 ANTIFUNGAL AGENTS OF YEAST CULTURES FROM BURN PATIENTS

Patients with significant degrees of immunocompromise, such as cancer AIDS and large burns, who have received significant amounts of antibio tics, may develop infections with yeast organisms. Over a 3-year perio d, all patients with positive fungal blood cultures and most wounds of patients with large bums considered to be at risk of yeast infection were selected and tested for their susceptibility to five antifungal a gents, amphotericin B, ketoconazole, miconazole, diflucan, and 5-fluor ocytosine. In all, 244 specimens of yeast were tested: 142 Candida alb icans, 52 Candida parapsilosis, 26 Candida tropicalis and 13 Trichospo ron beigelii, A limited number of other isolates of Candida (12) were also encottntered. All Candida organisms were sensitive to amphoterici n B. There was wide variation in regard to the susceptibility to the o ther four agents, with C. albicans and C. tropicalis being largely res istant to miconazole and ketoconazole, T. beigelii was recovered in 13 patients. One-half of these organisms was resistant to amphotericin B . Awareness of variations in species and susceptibility are helpful in the selection of appropriate therapeutic antifungal agents.