Evaluation of the Anaerobe-Tek system for identification of anaerobic bacteria

The Anaerobe-Tek system of Flow Laboratories, Inc. (McLean, Va.), is a new bacterial identification system which uses Gram morphology, sporulation, and reactions from 15 agar-based biochemical tests to generate a six-digit code number for identification of anaerobic bacteria. Supplemental tests are recommended when necessary to complete species identification. Individual test and identification performance of this system was evaluated by testing 216 anaerobic bacteria representing 31 species and one Centers for Disease Control unnamed group in parallel with a routine clinical laboratory identification system. Most of the tests in the Anaerobe-Tek system performed well; 85% of the organisms were correctly identified. The 32 (15%) failures in identification were due to omission from the identification code data base (38%), false-negative indole reactions (22%), and other incorrect biochemical reactions (40%). The replacement of the recommended indole test with an extraction method using the inoculum broth and an expansion of the data base of the system could raise the correct identification for this organism population to over 90% with no change in the test materials.