TY - JOUR AU - Denning, David AU - Perlin, David AU - Muldoon, Eavan AU - Colombo, Arnaldo Lopes AU - Chakrabarti, Arunaloke AU - Richardson, Malcolm AU - Sorrell, Tania T1 - Delivering on Antimicrobial Resistance Agenda Not Possible without Improving Fungal Diagnostic Capabilities T2 - Emerging Infectious Disease journal PY - 2017 VL - 23 IS - 2 SP - 177 SN - 1080-6059 AB - Antimicrobial resistance, a major public health concern, largely arises from excess use of antibiotic and antifungal drugs. Lack of routine diagnostic testing for fungal diseases exacerbates the problem of antimicrobial drug empiricism, both antibiotic and antifungal. In support of this contention, we cite 4 common clinical situations that illustrate this problem: 1) inaccurate diagnosis of fungal sepsis in hospitals and intensive care units, resulting in inappropriate use of broad-spectrum antibacterial drugs in patients with invasive candidiasis; 2) failure to diagnose chronic pulmonary aspergillosis in patients with smear-negative pulmonary tuberculosis; 3) misdiagnosis of fungal asthma, resulting in unnecessary treatment with antibacterial drugs instead of antifungal drugs and missed diagnoses of life-threatening invasive aspergillosis in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; and 4) overtreatment and undertreatment of Pneumocystis pneumonia in HIV-positive patients. All communities should have access to nonculture fungal diagnostics, which can substantially benefit clinical outcome, antimicrobial stewardship, and control of antimicrobial resistance. KW - Aspergillus KW - Candida KW - Pneumocystis KW - Histoplasma KW - Cryptococcus KW - antimicrobial resistance KW - antimicrobial drugs KW - antibiotic drugs KW - antifungal drugs KW - fungi KW - bacteria KW - HIV/AIDS and other retroviruses KW - tuberculosis and other mycobacteria KW - respiratory infections KW - United States KW - Pneumonia DO - 10.3201/eid2302.152042 UR - https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/23/2/15-2042_article ER - End of Reference