Validity of the urine dipslide under daily practice conditions.

BACKGROUND So far, the validity of urine dipslides has been studied only under optimal conditions, which may not reflect the situation in daily practice. OBJECTIVE We studied the validity of the urine dipslide as performed under daily practice conditions and assessed the influence of the incubation period (24 h versus 48 h) on validity. METHODS Fresh urine samples of patients with signs/symptoms of a possible urinary tract infection (UTI) were examined in general practice via a nitrite test, a urine sediment and a dipslide. A second dipslide was inoculated and sent to the hospital microbiology laboratory for culture. This culture acted as gold standard. We calculated the sensitivity and specificity of the tests performed. RESULTS Of the 273 patient episodes included, 62% had a UTI (166 of 268 cultures). The sensitivity of the dipslide performed in daily general practice was 73% and the specificity was 94%. CONCLUSION The validity of the dipslide read under practice conditions is lower than under optimal conditions. Actions to improve performance are needed. Nonetheless, using the dipslide instead of the sediment as a second step after the nitrite test would improve the diagnostic work-up of UTI.