Submitted by GAtherton on 15 September 2017
The UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), the UK authority tasked with advising on quality standards for health services has released guidance for the use of the Fungitell assay, a kit developed to assist diagnosis of fungal infection by measuring beta glucans (a component of fungal cell walls) in blood serum.This kit provides a result in 1 hour. Existing culture based diagnoses take several days to provide evidence of a fungal infection, so there is a clear benefit if time-saving is important and of course it often is in cases of invasive fungal infections such as Acute Invasive Aspergillosis as delays in starting treatment are known to negatively impact outcomes.
The briefing describes the outcomes of 5 studies that demonstrate Fungitell is a useful tool to safely rule out invasive fungal infection, avoid unnecessary prescription and to stop antifungal treatment.
The potential cost is similar or less than existing techniques and of course, there is a saving if expensive antifungal medication can be stopped.
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