Pulmonary candidiasis in patients with cancer: an autopsy study.
For patients who had cancer and autopsy-proven pneumonia, we evaluated whether cultures of respiratory secretions (sputum and/or bronchoalveolar lavage) performed < or =4 weeks before autopsy were a reliable basis for the diagnosis of pulmonary candidiasis. Pulmonary candidiasis was identified at autopsy in 36 patients, but common clinical predictors were insensitive for this diagnosis. For sputum culture, the sensitivity, specificity, and the positive and negative predictive values were 85%, 60%, 42%, and 93%, respectively; for bronchoalveolar lavage culture, these values were 71%, 57%, 29%, and 89%, respectively.
Kontoyiannis
D P
DP
Department of Infectious Diseases, Infection Control, and Employee Health, University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 77030, USA. dkontoyi@mdanderson.org
Reddy
B T
BT
Torres
H A
HA
Luna
M
M
Lewis
R E
RE
Tarrand
J
J
Bodey
G P
GP
Raad
I I
II
D001344:Autopsy; D002177:Candidiasis / Q000150:complications / Q000473:pathology*; D006801:Humans; D008172:Lung Diseases, Fungal / Q000150:complications / Q000473:pathology*; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000150:complications*; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D013183:Sputum / Q000382:microbiology