Why should we monitor (1-3)-β-D-glucan levels during invasive candidiasis? just ask your ophthalmologist!

摘要

We read with great interest the article by Sims et al. published in a recent issue of the Journal of Clinical Microbiology (1), in which the authors established the usefulness of (l-3)-beta-D-glucan (BG) serum measurement as a prognostic marker of treatment outcome, by correlating initial and final BG levels with the therapeutic responses in patients with proven invasive candidiasis (IC). Remarkably, a positive (decrease) or negative (increase) slope in BG levels correlated, respectively, with the success or the failure of antifungal treatment. Unfortunately, few patients with hard-to-treat fungal infections (i.e., endophthalmitis, endocarditis, meningitis, osteomyelitis) were studied (1).