Open AccessOptimization of incubation duration of culture media in microbiology
Author(s) -
Éric Farfour,
Lucie Limousin,
Amandine Henry,
Emilie Cardot,
P Cahen,
Didier Lecointe,
Émilie Jolly,
Marc Vasse,
Damien Mathonnet
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
annales de biologie clinique
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.167
H-Index - 27
eISSN - 1950-6112
pISSN - 0003-3898
DOI - 10.1684/abc.2019.1474
Subject(s) - incubation , incubation period , duration (music) , microbiological culture , microbiology and biotechnology , computer science , food science , biology , bacteria , biochemistry , physics , genetics , acoustics
In order to perform biological analysis, clinical laboratories apply the instructions of reagent suppliers. For culture media these instructions are often incomplete and poorly adapted to the variety of clinical samples and micro-organisms. The REMIC can help to overcome these shortcomings. Required time of incubation for culture media are proposed based on the nature of the sample and the type of micro-organism suspected. Nevertheless, they are most often expressed in multiple of 24 hours and they are often considered as minimal by the laboratories. As the samples are inoculated "continuously", while the readings are most often done at a single definite time of the day, we propose a strategy to optimize incubation duration of cultures medium. A time of incubation in the day so-called "limit" is defined. From this, the incubations are stopped or prolonged according to the results of the culture and the direct examination. As the instructions of suppliers of culture media are not adapted, it appears necessary that these suppliers relies on the repositories of professional societies as this is the case for agars medias used for antibiotic susceptibility testing.