Although official guidelines recommend a plate counting method for testing the susceptibility of mycobacteria to disinfectants, manufacturers usually prefer to employ the BACTEC procedure. Data showing that the BACTEC method overestimates the activity of a glutaraldehyde-based disinfectant against Mycobacterium tuberculosis in comparison with a conventional plate counting procedure are presented.

In a multicenter study involving three reference centers for mycobacteria, the rate of recovery of acid-fast bacilli (AFB) and the mean time to their detection from clinical specimens was determined by using the Mycobacteria Growth Indicator Tube (MGIT). These parameters were compared to those assessed by the radiometric BACTEC 460 TB system and by cultivation on solid media. Clinical specimens...

Arthritis after plant injury is often apparently aseptic. We report two cases due to Pantoea agglomerans. In one case, the bacterium was isolated only from the pediatric blood culture media, BACTEC Peds Plus, monitored in BACTEC 9240, and not from the other media inoculated with the joint fluid. This procedure could help improve the diagnosis of septic arthritis.

OBJECTIVE Infections are the major cause of morbidity and mortality in febrile neutropenic patients with malignancy. Rapid diagnostic tests are needed for prompt diagnosis and early treatment which is crucial for optimal management. We assessed the utility of soluble triggering receptor expressed on myeloid cells (sTREM-1) in the diagnosis of bacteremia and fungemia in febrile neutropenic patie...

Identification of members of the Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex and the M. avium-M. intracellulare complex (MAC) directly from primary BACTEC cultures was evaluated by using acridinium-ester-labeled DNA probes (AccuProbe; GenProbe, Inc., San Diego, Calif.). In preliminary experiments, blood present in samples was found to interfere with the assay because of nonspecific chemiluminescence, wh...

Incorporating resins in blood culture media can effectively reduce the activities of several antibiotics. It was shown that the activities of some generally used antibiotics decreased by 80 to 90% within 2 h in Bactec Plus Aerobic/F resin-containing culture medium. Bactec vials containing resins were still found to be positive for bacteria when antibiotics were present. The addition of beta-lac...

In a collaborative study at three university hospitals, the recovery of microorganisms and the speed of detection of microbial growth by the BacT/Alert (Organon Teknika Corporation, Durham, N.C.) and BACTEC 660/730 (Becton-Dickinson Diagnostic Instrument Systems, Sparks, Md.) nonradiometric blood culture systems were compared. A total of 5,918 comparisons were made between BacT/Alert aerobic an...

The BACTEC system (Becton Dickinson, Sparks, Md.) was compared with culture on Löwenstein-Jensen egg medium for the detection of Mycobacterium malmoense in lymph node samples from children with lymphadenitis. It was found to be significantly more sensitive and rapid. The use of the BACTEC system is thus recommended as a complement to culture on solid media for the primary isolation of atypical ...

BACTEC 460 has now been phased out, so the search for an alternative is imperative. We have determined the activity of standard anti-tuberculosis drugs against intramacrophage Mycobacterium tuberculosis, in vitro, by using BACTEC 460 and MGIT 960 methods. The minimum inhibitory concentrations of isoniazid, rifampicin, ethambutol and streptomycin against intracellular M. tuberculosis H37Rv were ...