A flow cytometric urine analyzer for bacteria and white blood cell counts plus urine dipstick test for rapid screening of bacterial urinary tract infection

Abstract

Background: Bacterial urinary tract infection (UTI) is one of the most common patient problems that have no reliably definite diagnosis. The gold standard urine culture is usually delayed and increases laboratory workload. Objectives: To find a rapid method for the screening of bacterial urinary tract infection, the performance of four urinalysis parameters from automated urine dipstick test and flow cytometry were evaluated against the urine culture method. Methods: Urine cultures were performed on 372 routine specimens of suspected UTI. Urine dipstick tests were performed using an automated reader. An automated urine particle analyzer was used for quantitative counting of bacteria and white blood cells. Results: For screening of UTI, urinary bacteria count ≥14.2 cells/μL gave the highest sensitivity of 95.76% and 44.88% specificity. Conclusion: We suggest using urinary bacteria count for screening of UTI. This method can reduce the laboratory workload for processing urine culture by 30.64%.