A comparison of three rapid and accurate bioluminescent antibiotic susceptibility tests.

Introduction: Rapid determination of microorganisms' antibiotic susceptibility remains a great challenge for the clinical diagnosis of infectious diseases. In this study, we compare three rapid bioluminescent antibiotic susceptibility tests with the conventional normalised microdilution method.

Methods: The susceptibility of two bacterial and two fungal strains to a 6h incubation with one of eight standard antibiotics was investigated by the ATP, AK and QNO bioluminescent methods.

Results: Three rapid and accurate antibiotic susceptibility testing were investigated performing ATP, AK and QNO bioluminescent assays. All the results were in accordance with those obtained using a standard microdilution assay. All these methods were sensitive and faster than the previously well-known ones.

Discussion: The development of bioluminescent determination methods could lead to accurate and useful antibiotic susceptibility testing.