The value of nasopharyngeal culture in predicting the etiology of acute otitis media in children less than two years of age.

Background: In selecting treatment of acute otitis media (AOM), knowledge of its etiology would be valuable. We revisited the possibility to use the nasopharyngeal culture of Streptococcus pneumoniae (Pnc) and Haemophilus influenzae (Hi) for predicting their presence in the middle ear fluid (MEF) during AOM.

Methods: The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV) of bacterial culture of the nasopharyngeal aspirate (NPA) in predicting the presence of the same pathogen in the MEF were assessed during AOM events among children followed from 2 to 24 months of age.