Infective endocarditis is a potentially fatal condition, and identifying the pathogen is crucial to optimizing antibiotic treatment. While a blood culture takes time and may yield negative results, it remains the gold standard for diagnosis, blood culture-negative endocarditis, which accounts for up to 20% of infective endocarditis cases, poses a clinical challenge with increasing mortality. To better understand the etiology of blood culture-negative infective endocarditis, we reviewed non-culture-based strategies and compared the results. Serology tests work best in limited pathogens, such as Coxiella burnetii and Bartonella infections. Most of the pathogens identified by broad-range PCR tests are Streptococcus spp, Staphylococcus spp and Propionibacterium spp. adding specific real-time PCR assays to the systematic PCR testing of patients with blood culture-negative endocarditis will increase the efficiency of diagnosis. Recently, metagenomic next-generation sequencing has also shown promising results.
CITATION STYLE
Lin, K. P., Yeh, T. K., Chuang, Y. C., Wang, L. A., Fu, Y. C., & Liu, P. Y. (2023). Blood Culture Negative Endocarditis: A Review of Laboratory Diagnostic Approaches. International Journal of General Medicine. Dove Medical Press Ltd. https://doi.org/10.2147/IJGM.S393329
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