Testing the LightCycler Candida Kit MGRADE in artificially-contaminated whole blood and serum: Consequences for the diagnosis of invasive candidiasis

Summary Fungal infections are a cause of morbidity and mortality in immunocompromised patients. Among fungal infections, Candida albicans is the most frequent. A standardized method to detect C. albicans in whole blood or serum with LightCycler Candida Kit M GRADE was tested for the first time. Whole blood and serum were artificially infected with C. albicans cells or DNA, respectively. Sensitivity was 5 × 10 2  CFU/ml in whole blood and five copies of genome per milliliter in serum. None commercially available real-time PCR kit has been reported yet to detect C. albicans and it is the first time that such a kit is described to detect C. albicans in biological samples. However, interest is limited because the kit LightCycler Candida Kit M GRADE only detects C. albicans .