Korean J Clin Microbiol.  2007 Oct;10(2):150-153.

Rapid Identification of Candida albicans by 'Spiking' on Blood and Chocolate Agar Plates

• Lee MK
• Park BR

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Colonial morphology of Candida albicans known as 'spiking' on a primary isolation blood agar plate (BAP) allows rapid and presumptive identification of C. albicans. We evaluated the 'spiking' appearance to identify C. albicans.
METHODS
A total of 144 fully identified clinical isolates of yeasts and 10 type strains of yeasts were tested. All isolates obtained from the 5% CO2 incubation on BAP and chocolate agar plate (CHOC) were macroscopically examined for the presence of an irregular margin (spiking). The germ tube test was performed by incubating test organisms in 0.5 mL of pooled human sera.
RESULTS
The sensitivity for BAP-spiking, CHOC-spiking and germ tube test were 93.7%, 91.1%, and 98.7%, respectively. The specificity for three methods was 100%.
CONCLUSION
Use of the spiking identification on BAP can be useful for the economic and rapid presumptive identification of C. albicans in routine laboratories.

Keyword

Candida albicans; Identification; Spiking; Germ tube test

MeSH Terms

Agar*
Cacao*
Candida albicans*
Candida*
Humans
Sensitivity and Specificity
Yeasts
Agar