Posted by: sarkekodimag February 21, 2010
Login in to Rate this Post:
0 
? 
?
KhilaNath bro,
Why dont you take a picture of the affected area and post it here. Your description is incomplete to make decision. As i recommended earlier, take chickenpox vaccine. It might help if it is related to cold sore.
Now, lets talk about culture.
Culture is not a magic tray where you dump the smear of bodily fluid and after two days it will become yellow or red or blue or orange and tell you what bacteria or viruses are present. Culture is also specific to particular organism. Some organisms grow in acidic medium whereas some in alkaline and still there are some that will grow in neutral medium and do not ingore the fact that there are still so many that will never grow in that culture media. This is merely an example to clarify why you can always question the result of the culture and lab error. Doc should treat a patient not the number. If i go on and on here it will be 30 page long document. So, let me cut is short and give you few simple examples.
Acid fast bacteria (this group includes Mycobacterium species.. TB, Leprocy. and so many other dz): To culture this type of bacteria it will take several weeks. And sometimes 8-12 weeks and sometimes they will never grow. So, will you wait until you see the result of the culture or will treat the pt with antibiotics??? A lot of times you start therapy covering all the organisms you suspect more likely to cause it and looking at the response of the patient and lab results, you taper the therapy to treat the person by adding up or cutting down some of the meds the pt is already on. There are so many other bacteria which can not be cultured in Laboratory setting.
I am not saying doubt all the result you get it from lab. Matter of fact, its your health care provider who will do it not you. E. coli is another gram negative bacteria which will grow in culture within 12-18 hours.
Another scenario: if you have multiple bacteria infection and they culture the specimen in one media. You might see only one group of bacteria growing up in the culture media and still miss the others. Coz, the culture media might not be suitable for the growth of other bacteria. Thats why, you only see one set of bacteria and your health care provider will target that one particular bacteria. If pt gets better thats awesome.. but if pt's condition deteriorate your doc will add some other drugs to cover the microorganisms that do not grow in that particular culture and likely to cause the existing etiological condition.
Scenario 2: There are some atypical bacteria (legionella sp., chlamydia sp., mycoplasma sp. and so on) which require specialized culture media for their growth. If you dump them in any X, Y, Z media, they will not grow.
Scenario 3: Culturing virus>>> in research or theory i would do it. But for clinical purposes the significance of viral culture is very very low. Take a moment and think what virus is: It does not have any cytoplasm. It is only composed of genetic materials ( dna, rna...and whtever). Viruses use host's cytoplasm for its growth. Now, how are you going to culture virus in regular culture media?? only specialized labs have that capability to grow different sets of viruses. and it might take so many weeks too. and could be very expensive too.
Bottom Line: Culture can miss so many things. And i am sure they might not have cutlured virus. How many days did it take them to give you the results?? Culture is not limited to change in color red or orange or yellow or blue, there is a lot on it. I hope, somebody here with laboratory science background might elaborate so many things in the thread.
PS: what did your doc suspect it to be? and what kind of treament (tx) regimen you were on before? I still believe your doc is in the best position to make a decision for you not us. We are only throwing stones here and there thinking that it might hit the target. Please dont hesitate to ask questions to your doc.
Why dont you take a picture of the affected area and post it here. Your description is incomplete to make decision. As i recommended earlier, take chickenpox vaccine. It might help if it is related to cold sore.
Now, lets talk about culture.
Culture is not a magic tray where you dump the smear of bodily fluid and after two days it will become yellow or red or blue or orange and tell you what bacteria or viruses are present. Culture is also specific to particular organism. Some organisms grow in acidic medium whereas some in alkaline and still there are some that will grow in neutral medium and do not ingore the fact that there are still so many that will never grow in that culture media. This is merely an example to clarify why you can always question the result of the culture and lab error. Doc should treat a patient not the number. If i go on and on here it will be 30 page long document. So, let me cut is short and give you few simple examples.
Acid fast bacteria (this group includes Mycobacterium species.. TB, Leprocy. and so many other dz): To culture this type of bacteria it will take several weeks. And sometimes 8-12 weeks and sometimes they will never grow. So, will you wait until you see the result of the culture or will treat the pt with antibiotics??? A lot of times you start therapy covering all the organisms you suspect more likely to cause it and looking at the response of the patient and lab results, you taper the therapy to treat the person by adding up or cutting down some of the meds the pt is already on. There are so many other bacteria which can not be cultured in Laboratory setting.
I am not saying doubt all the result you get it from lab. Matter of fact, its your health care provider who will do it not you. E. coli is another gram negative bacteria which will grow in culture within 12-18 hours.
Another scenario: if you have multiple bacteria infection and they culture the specimen in one media. You might see only one group of bacteria growing up in the culture media and still miss the others. Coz, the culture media might not be suitable for the growth of other bacteria. Thats why, you only see one set of bacteria and your health care provider will target that one particular bacteria. If pt gets better thats awesome.. but if pt's condition deteriorate your doc will add some other drugs to cover the microorganisms that do not grow in that particular culture and likely to cause the existing etiological condition.
Scenario 2: There are some atypical bacteria (legionella sp., chlamydia sp., mycoplasma sp. and so on) which require specialized culture media for their growth. If you dump them in any X, Y, Z media, they will not grow.
Scenario 3: Culturing virus>>> in research or theory i would do it. But for clinical purposes the significance of viral culture is very very low. Take a moment and think what virus is: It does not have any cytoplasm. It is only composed of genetic materials ( dna, rna...and whtever). Viruses use host's cytoplasm for its growth. Now, how are you going to culture virus in regular culture media?? only specialized labs have that capability to grow different sets of viruses. and it might take so many weeks too. and could be very expensive too.
Bottom Line: Culture can miss so many things. And i am sure they might not have cutlured virus. How many days did it take them to give you the results?? Culture is not limited to change in color red or orange or yellow or blue, there is a lot on it. I hope, somebody here with laboratory science background might elaborate so many things in the thread.
PS: what did your doc suspect it to be? and what kind of treament (tx) regimen you were on before? I still believe your doc is in the best position to make a decision for you not us. We are only throwing stones here and there thinking that it might hit the target. Please dont hesitate to ask questions to your doc.