New Technology Significantly Reduces Pathogen Identification Time
The Accelerate PhenoTM system is the latest addition to the UAMS Clinical Microbiology Laboratory’s array of industry-redefining technologies for the identification and treatment of infectious diseases.
“We are one of the first in the world introducing this technology,” said Eric Rosenbaum, M.D., M.P.H., medical director of the lab. “The way it works is nothing short of revolutionary – part of a wider renaissance in clinical microbiology we are experiencing. But more importantly for our clinicians and patients, what it gives them is time.”
The Accelerate Pheno is an FDA-approved system that identifies pathogens associated with life-threatening blood-borne infections – and identifies the antibiotics most effective against them. Conventional methodology generally takes two days to identify a pathogen and about three days for the antibiotic results.
“What makes the Accelerate Pheno groundbreaking is that it can identify a pathogen in one hour and then tell us how to treat it several hours later. For critically ill patients with sepsis, hours compared to days can save lives – this marks a major change in the way UAMS will now approach these complex infections,” Rosenbaum said.
Most significant is the ability of the Accelerate Pheno to test a pathogen’s susceptibility to various antibiotics and provide a score indicating which antibiotic would be most effective.
“This feature is new and unique,” Rosenbaum said. “It means getting patients on the most appropriate antibiotic days faster, off more-expensive broad spectrum antibiotics and on the road to recovery.”
The Accelerate Pheno is one of the best examples of “medicine meets the tech world.” The instrument records video of a pathogen’s growth and uses computer algorithms to compare it to an archive of growth pattern information – this is a first for clinical diagnostics.
The Accelerate Pheno is just one of several technologies recently acquired by UAMS that improve identification of diseases, including tuberculosis, meningitis, methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), influenza, clostridium difficile (C. diff) and more.
For more information, call 501-526-7511 or email errosenbaum@uams.edu.