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|Science Translational Medicine reports an RT-PCR that can distinguish a viral pneumonia from a bacterial pneumonia. Christopher Woods and Geoffrey Ginsburg at Duke claim that the assay monitors human genes that react differently to viral disease than to a bacterial infection.
Based on a trial of 102 patients with fever and respiratory symptoms, the test showed 94 percent sensitivity and 89 percent specificity.
PCR might be an expensive test at the clinical level. It would be nice to run such tests as a routine if the small clinical lab can have the technology without involving big pharma patents.
With the new terminology for basilar rales, namely "crackles," one might expect the new physician to be confused over the identification of the subtle left lower lobe sounds which sound nothing like crackles. The PCR might help and more so for upper respiratory infections. Professor Kemp once told me as a resident on pediatric rotation that I was treating an upper lobe pneumonia with a lower lobe antibiotic. It won't hurt to look at the gram stain either.
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Sci. Transl. Med. 5 203ra126 (2013)
Based on a trial of 102 patients with fever and respiratory symptoms, the test showed 94 percent sensitivity and 89 percent specificity.
PCR might be an expensive test at the clinical level. It would be nice to run such tests as a routine if the small clinical lab can have the technology without involving big pharma patents.
With the new terminology for basilar rales, namely "crackles," one might expect the new physician to be confused over the identification of the subtle left lower lobe sounds which sound nothing like crackles. The PCR might help and more so for upper respiratory infections. Professor Kemp once told me as a resident on pediatric rotation that I was treating an upper lobe pneumonia with a lower lobe antibiotic. It won't hurt to look at the gram stain either.
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Sci. Transl. Med. 5 203ra126 (2013)
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