[Diagnostic bronchoscopy--mycologic and bacteriologic findings]

The authors studied the findings of mycotic and bacterial agents in the lower air passages of 122 patients with lung disease examined by bronchoscopy. The series represents a current profile of patients investigated at the Department of tuberculosis and respiratory diseases, Pardubice hospital within 17 months of the years 1982-1983. Bronchial swabs were compared with the findings in the swabs of the throat taken immediately before the endoscopic examination. Yeast organisms were isolated from the bronchi of 12 patients, and from the throats of 50 subjects examined. Amongst the agents isolated, Candida albicans showed the highest frequency of occurrence (68.0%). Isolation of Aspergillus fumigatus from the bronchi revealed pulmonary mycetoma in one case. Pathogenic and potentially pathogenic bacterial flora was isolated from the bronchial swabs in 40 subjects examined. A total of 47.5% findings belonged to patients suffering from inflammatory disease of the lower air passages. Isolations of Mycobacterium tuberculosis from the bronchial swabs of three subjects examined, where other cultivation examinations gave negative results, are considered by the authors as a contribution to the differential diagnosis in infiltrative disease of the lung. The value of examination of directed swabs at bronchoscopy by culture, the problems of contamination and the reliability of the results obtained are discussed.