[Fungemia in hospitals of the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina].

Background: The incidence of fungi like pathogens in hospitals varies by regions.

Objectives: Our goal was not only to record the incidence and etiology of fungaemia, but also the change during the 4 years analysed, to determine the time of detection in automated blood culture and by lysis-centrifugation, and finally to assess the gender, age and underlying disease of the patients with fungaemia.

Methods: An observational multicentre study of fungaemia was conducted in hospitals in the Mycology Network of Buenos Aires.

Results: A total of 190,920 blood cultures were processed: 182,050 automated blood culture and 8,870 lysis-centrifugation. Fungi were recovered in 1,020 episodes. The overall incidence of fungaemia was 1.72/1,000 admissions; 683 episodes were due to Candida (68%), and 325 (32%) to other fungi: 214 Cryptococcus, 105 Histoplasma, 7 Rhodotorula, 5 Trichosporon, 2 Pichia, 2 Acremonium, one Saccharomyces and one Fusarium. The incidence of candidaemia was 1.15/1,000 admissions with a wide variation between centres (0.35 to 2.65). Most Candida isolates (97%) were detected in the first 2 days of incubation. Candida albicans was recovered in 43% of the episodes. In fungaemia other than candidaemia, the predominant fungi were Cryptococcus and Histoplasma capsulatum.

Conclusions: The incidence remained stable during the study period. Fungaemia by Candida were predominant. C. albicans was involved in less than a half of the episodes. The recovery of Cryptoccocus and H. capsulatum is strongly associated with HIV patients.