Pneumococcal colonisation density: a new marker for disease severity in HIV-infected adults with pneumonia.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

A high genomic load of Pneumococcus from blood or cerebrospinal fluid has been associated with increased mortality. We aimed to analyse whether nasopharyngeal colonisation density in HIV-infected patients with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) is associated with markers of disease severity or poor outcome.

Methods

Quantitative lytA real-time PCR was performed on nasopharyngeal swabs in HIV-infected South African adults hospitalised for acute CAP at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital, Soweto, South Africa. Pneumonia aetiology was considered pneumococcal if any sputum culture or Gram stain, urinary pneumococcal C-polysaccharide-based antigen, blood culture or whole blood lytA real-time PCR revealed pneumococci.

Results

There was a moderate correlation between th

SUBMITTER: Albrich WC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4127937 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature