Automated Strain Typing System Offers Potential Benefits for Outbreak Management

The Microbiology Department at Birmingham City Hospital has been investigating the use of automated strain typing with bioMérieux’s DiversiLab™ in the early identification of microbial outbreaks to help improve infection control strategies for neonatal care. Seema Desai, Specialist Registrar in the department, explained: “Confirmation of outbreaks is often delayed by the need to send samples to an external laboratory for strain typing. To overcome this lag between sampling and results, we have been investigating the possibility of using the DiversiLab System to accelerate implementation of infection control strategies, limiting the impact of an outbreak on patients and staff.

“We recently performed a retrospective study on an ESBL+ K. pneumoniae outbreak in the hospital’s neonatal unit, assessing the DiversiLab System’s ability to rapidly identify an outbreak by comparing the results obtained to those from our reference laboratory. Both systems offered near identical results, and the DiversiLab was able to successfully identify and group together all of the isolates from the outbreak strain with greater than 97.7% similarity.

This study indicates that the rapid time-toresults offered by DiversiLab could have led to earlier initiation of infection control measures, potentially reducing the number of patients affected and the level of disruption to ward management and the care of non-affected patients.”