Koo S, Bryar JM, Baden LR et al. J Clin Microbiol 2010;48:1255–60.
In this study, the authors evaluated the use of the galactomannan (GM) assay to determine the prognosis of patients with invasive aspergillosis. They showed that baseline GM values and decline in GM value after 1 week are associated with mortality at 6 weeks, supporting the future use of GM testing as a prognostic tool.
The potential role of the galactomannan (GM) test as a prognostic tool in confirmed invasive aspergillosis (IA) has not been fully elucidated. This retrospective analysis included all patients who had a diagnosis of proven or probable IA, and who had at least one GM value of ≥0.50 at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital (Boston, MA, USA) between January 2005 and March 2009.