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QUALITY CONTROL OF LABORATORY DIAGNOSTICS
101
LABORATORY DIAGNOSIS OF NEISSERIA GONORRHOEAE IN ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA: INVENTORY, PERFORMANCE CHARACTERISTICS AND RECOMMENDED OPTIMISATIONS
M. Unemo 1, A. Savicheva 2, O. Budilovskaya 2, E. Sokolovskiy 3, M. Larsson 1, M. Domeika 4 ([email protected])
1 National Reference Laboratory for Pathogenic Neisseria, Department of Clinical Microbiology, Orebro University Hospital, Sweden;
2 D.O. Ott Research Institute of Obstetrics and Gynecology, RAMS, St. Petersburg, Russia;
3 Department of Dermatology and Venereal diseases with clinic, Pavlov State Medical University, St. Petersburg, Russia;
4 Department of Medical Sciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
Objectives: To perform a comprehensive inventory of the number of samples, performance characteristics, and quality assurance of the laboratory diagnosis of Neisseria gonorrhoeae at five laboratories in St Petersburg and Leningradskaya Oblast, Russia, in 2004, and to recommend optimisations for an increased adherence to international evidence based recommendations of diagnostics.
Methods: Surveillance data were obtained with questionnaire and site visits. For evaluation of the culture media utilised at the laboratories, N gonorrhoeae reference strains (n=29) were used.
Results: During 2004 the total numbers of N gonorrhoeae samples analysed at the five laboratories using microscopy of stained smears and culturing were 330 879 (407 positive) and 38 020 (420 positive), respectively. Four laboratories used a Russian non-selective culture medium-that is, Complegon, and one laboratory utilised Biocult-GC. Both media seemed suboptimal. Only two of the laboratories used any species confirmative assay. Antibiotic susceptibility test-
ing of N gonorrhoeae was performed at only two of the laboratories and each year only occasional isolates were analysed. None of the laboratories comprised a complete laboratory quality assurance system.
Conclusions: According to international recommendations, the diagnosis of N gonorrhoeae in St Petersburg and Leningradskaya Oblast, Russia, is suboptimal. More samples need to be analysed by culturing on a highly nutritious and selective medium and, furthermore, species confirmation and antibiotic susceptibility testing should be more frequently performed. In addition, the utilised methods for cultur-ing and antibiotic susceptibility testing, including medium and interpretative criteria used, ought to be optimised, standardised, and quality assured using systematic internal and external quality controls.
(Sex Transm Inf, 2006, 82, 41-4; available at: http://www. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db= pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_ uids=16461601&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_doc-sum)
RESEARCH PROJECTS ON OPTIMIZATION OF LABORATORY DIAGNOSIS OF SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED INFECTIONS
E. V. Shipitsyna 1, K. V. Shalepo 1, A. M. Savicheva 1([email protected]), M. Domeika 2
1 D.O. Ott Research Institute of Obstetrics and Gynecology, RAMS, St. Petersburg, Russia;
2 Department of Medical Sciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
Introduction
Since 1998, Russian-Swedish project on STI diagnosis and management has been realized in St. Petersburg and Leningrad Oblast. The main goal of the project is to improve the quality of diagnosis and treatment of STIs. To optimize STI diagnostics, it was planned to solve the following tasks: • development and introduction of standards and
algorithms of STI management;
• optimization and standardization of laboratory diagnosis of STIs, and introduction of a quality control system;
• evaluation of the prevalence of infections affecting the reproductive tract using modern strategies and methods.
Within the project, a number of studies aimed to optimize laboratory diagnosis of STIs in Russia were performed, and the results were presented at international meetings and published in internation-
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VOL LVI SUPPLEMENT may/2007
ISSN 1684-0461 ■
