Publications

Objectives

Gastroenteritis can be caused by a number of different bacteria, viruses, and parasites. Gastroenteritis is typically mild in presentation with symptoms that are self-resolving in immunocompetent individuals. While these infections are rarely the cause of severe morbidity and mortality in developed countries, severe infections requiring treatment can occur in the very young, the elderly, and the immunocompromised. Conventional diagnostics for gastrointestinal pathogens include culture, ova and parasite exams, and antigen detection tests. These methods, however, are associated with long turnaround times, require extensive hands-on time, and may have poor sensitivity. With upwards of 95% of stool specimens negative for any gastrointestinal pathogen, these conventional diagnostic tests are not an ideal use of technologist time in the laboratory. New molecular-based methods for the detection of the bacterial causes of gastroenteritis can provide timely and accurate diagnosis of gastroenteritis, minimizing the medical technologist time required in the workup of both positive and negative stool specimens. We evaluated the performance of the sample-to-result Verigene Enteric Pathogens Nucleic Acid (EP) IUO Test for the detection of common bacterial (Salmonella spp., Shigella spp., Campylobacter, Vibrio spp., Yersinia enterocolitica) and toxin (stx1, stx2) causes of gastroenteritis directly from stool preserved in Cary-Blair media.