The Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) has published the annual update of the antimicrobial susceptibility testing standard M100-S21.
M100-S21 is for 'Performance Standards for Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing: 21st Informational Supplement' and is arranged in tabular format.
It provides updates of the latest recommendations for detecting emerging resistance of aerobic bacteria.
Therapeutic breakpoints included in the supplement are applied to MIC values determined by standard methods in order to assign an interpretation of susceptible, intermediate, or resistant.
This information assists clinicians with drug selection and interpretation and provides quality control and troubleshooting guidelines for clinical microbiology laboratories using the procedures standardised in CLSI documents 'Performance Standards for Antimicrobial Disk Susceptibility Tests: Approved Standard-Tenth Edition' (M02-A10) and 'Methods for Dilution Antimicrobial Susceptibility Tests for Bacteria That Grow Aerobically: Approved Standard-Eighth Edition' (M07-A8).
Clinicians depend heavily on information from the clinical microbiology laboratory for treatment of infected patients, especially those that are seriously ill.
The clinical importance of antimicrobial susceptibility test results requires that these tests be performed under optimal conditions within laboratories that have the capability to provide results for the newest antimicrobial agents.
