Utility of the BACTEC Myco/F lytic medium for the detection of mycobacteria in blood

This study aims to evaluate the performance of a new vial (Myco/F Lyric) fo r the detection of mycobacteria from blood specimens. This vial is monitore d in the BACTEC 9000 blood culture system. We compared it with the traditio nal method routinely used in our laboratory, which is a lysis-centrifugatio n based procedure. Of 275 samples tested in parallel by both methods, 23 fr om 20 patients grew mycobacteria (18 Mycobacterium avium complex, 4 M. tube rculosis and 1 M. simiae); 11 isolates were recovered using both systems, 1 2 were isolated with the Myco/F Lytic medium only, and none were isolated u sing the traditional method only (p < 0.05). Blood was the diagnostic Sampl e for 12 patients with the Myco/F Lytic system and only 7 with the traditio nal system. The mean time to detection of mycobacteria with Myco/F Lytic me dium was 17 days, whereas it was 44 days with the traditional method (p < 0 .001). Identification by DNA probes was performed directly from the Myco/F Lytic bottle. Myco/F Lytic is a rapid, simple, safe and highly reliable dia gnostic method for the detection of mycobacteria in blood. (C) 2000 Elsevie r Science Inc. All rights reserved.