Abstract
Objectives: We present the results of two European external quality assessments (EQAs) conducted in 2014 and 2016 under the auspices of the Study Group on Staphylococci and Staphylococcal Infections of ESCMID. The objective was to assess the performance of participating centres in characterizing Staphylococcus aureus using their standard in-house phenotypic and genotypic protocols. Methods: A total of 11 well-characterized blindly coded S. aureus (n " 9), Staphylococcus argenteus (n " 1) and Staphylococcus capitis (n " 1) strains were distributed to participants for analysis. Species identification, MIC determination, antimicrobial susceptibility testing, antimicrobial resistance and toxin gene detection and molecular typing including spa typing, SCCmec typing and MLST were performed. Results: Thirteen laboratories from 12 European countries participated in one EQA or both EQAs. Despite considerable diversity in the methods employed, good concordance (90%–100%) with expected results was obtained. Discrepancies were observed for: (i) identification of the S. argenteus strain; (ii) phenotypic detection of low-level resistance to oxacillin in the mecC-positive strain; (iii) phenotypic detection of the inducible MLSB strain; and (iv) WGS-based detection of some resistance and toxin genes. Conclusions: Overall, good concordance (90%–100%) with expected results was observed. In some instances, the accurate detection of resistance and toxin genes from WGS data proved problematic, highlighting the need for validated and internationally agreed-on bioinformatics pipelines before such techniques are implemented routinely by microbiology laboratories. We strongly recommend all national reference laboratories and laboratories acting as referral centres to participate in such EQA initiatives.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 2662-2666 |
Number of pages | 5 |
Journal | Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy |
Volume | 73 |
Issue number | 10 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 1 Oct 2018 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This work was supported by: the Institut Scientifique de Santé Publique (ISP-WIZ), Brussels, Belgium; the Ministry of Health, Denmark; Public Health England, UK; the National Staphylococcal Reference Laboratory, Greece, under the scientific responsibility of I. S. (grant number C954, Hellenic Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, HCDCP/KEELPNO); the Department of Health, Ireland; Fundac¸ão para a Ciência e Tecnologia (grant numbers UID/CBQ/04612/2013 to Research Unit MOSTMICRO; SFRH/BPD/111922/2015 to FCT); the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Poland, within the framework of the Mikrobank 2 Programme; the European Regional Development Fund within the EurHealth-1Health project (grant number EU/INTERREG VA-681377 to A. J. S. and A. W. F.); and ‘Santé Publique France’ the French national public health agency and the Hospices Civils de Lyon, Lyon, France. Limited financial support
Funding Information:
We thank all technical workers in the participating laboratories for their valuable contributions. This study was co-ordinated by the ESGS of ESCMID. This work was supported by: the Institut Scientifique de Santé Publique (ISP-WIZ), Brussels, Belgium; the Ministry of Health, Denmark; Public Health England, UK; the National Staphylococcal Reference Laboratory, Greece, under the scientific responsibility of I. S. (grant number C954, Hellenic Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, HCDCP/KEELPNO); the Department of Health, Ireland; Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (grant numbers UID/CBQ/04612/2013 to Research Unit MOSTMICRO; SFRH/BPD/111922/2015 to FCT); the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Poland, within the framework of the Mikrobank 2 Programme; the European Regional Development Fund within the EurHealth-1Health project (grant number EU/INTERREG VA-681377 to A. J. S. and A. W. F.); and ‘Santé Publique France’ the French national public health agency and the Hospices Civils de Lyon, Lyon, France. Limited financial support from the Study Group on Staphylococci and Staphylococcal Infections financed the EQA logistics.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2018. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy. All rights reserved.