Elsevier

Vaccine

Volume 32, Issue 1, 17 December 2013, Pages 165-179
Vaccine

Standard method for detecting upper respiratory carriage of Streptococcus pneumoniae: Updated recommendations from the World Health Organization Pneumococcal Carriage Working Group

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2013.08.062Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • We present updated recommendations from a World Health Organization working group.

  • These are a core set of standard methods for pneumococcal carriage studies.

  • Methods for the collection, transport and storage of nasopharyngeal samples are outlined.

  • Methods for identification and serotyping of pneumococci are described.

  • The epidemiological rationale for pneumococcal carriage studies is described.

Abstract

In 2003 the World Health Organization (WHO) convened a working group and published a set of standard methods for studies measuring nasopharyngeal carriage of Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus). The working group recently reconvened under the auspices of the WHO and updated the consensus standard methods. These methods describe the collection, transport and storage of nasopharyngeal samples, as well as provide recommendations for the identification and serotyping of pneumococci using culture and non-culture based approaches. We outline the consensus position of the working group, the evidence supporting this position, areas worthy of future research, and the epidemiological role of carriage studies. Adherence to these methods will reduce variability in the conduct of pneumococcal carriage studies undertaken in the context of pneumococcal vaccine trials, implementation studies, and epidemiology studies more generally so variability in methodology does not confound the interpretation of study findings.

Keywords

Nasopharynx
Carriage
Colonization
Pneumococcus

Cited by (0)

1

WHO Pneumococcal Carriage Working Group were participants at the Geneva meeting in March 2012 and included the authors listed above and Mark Alderson, PATH, USA; Bernard Beall, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, USA; Ron Dagan; Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel; David Goldblatt, University College London, UK; Birgitta Henriques-Normark, Karolinska Institutet, MTC and Karolinska University Hospital, Sweden; Andrew Greenhill; Papua New Guinea Institute of Medical Research, PNG and Monash University Gippsland Campus, Victoria, Australia; Jennifer Moïsi and Berthe Njanpop, Agence de Médecine Préventive, Institut Pasteur, France; Glaucia Paranhos-Baccala, Fondation Merieux, France; Karen Rudolph, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Alaska; Vicente Verez Bencomo, Centre for Biomolecular Chemistry, Cuba; Didrik Vestrheim, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Norway; Jeffrey Weiser, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, USA.