Gram staining of Pneumocystis sporozoites
Rankin, J.A.; Young, K.R.
Annals of Internal Medicine 100(6): 919
1984
ISSN/ISBN: 0003-4819 PMID: 6202175 Document Number: 240858
The report by A.M. Macher et al. describing the usefulness of gram staining for the diagnosis of P. carinii penumonia [see Protozoological Abstracts 8, 1409] prompted the use of gram stain on freshly obtained (<1 h old) cellular phase material obtained by bronchoalveolar lavage from 3 AIDS patients with suspected P. carinii pneumonia (subsequently confirmed by histological methods), and on cellular material obtained by bronchoalveolar lavage from 9 patients with the syndrome and histologically proven P. carinii pneumonia. In all 12 patients the gram-negative sporozoites were identified readily within 'coagula' by conventional light microscopy, although sporozoites seen on stains of freshly obtained specimens were slightly more discernible than those seen on stored slides.