Seventy-five percent of FN patients died before empirical antibiotic
therapy was introduced [2]. Empirical antibiotic therapy is
now used in all patients with FN. Antibiotic therapy based on the
most likely causative microorganism is administered to FN patients
as soon as possible, after taking blood cultures. However, the low
sensitivity of blood culture, the time required to identify the
causative microorganism by this methods are obstacles to the
prompt administration of appropriate and specific antibiotic
therapy.
In this study, we established a real-time PCR assay for the rapid
detection of bacteria and fungi in blood samples. Primers targeting
the 16S rRNA gene [3,4] and the 18S rRNA gene [6e9] were used to
detect bacteria and fungi, respectively