According to the World Health Organization, every year about 1 million cases of purulent bacterial meningitis (PBM) are registered in the world, of which 200 thousand cases end in death. Bacterial meningitis is polyethiologic, which makes the task of determining the pathogen the main in the organization of epidemiological surveillance, treatment regimens, planning of preventive and anti-epidemic measures. The quality of laboratory diagnostics has a key influence on this. The true incidence of meningitis of different etiology can be altered at low-efficiency laboratory diagnostics. This work was carried out to assess the effectiveness of existing laboratory methods for the detection of PBM pathogens: Haemophilus influenzae, Streptococcus pneumoniae and Neisseria meningitidis; as a part of the programme on sentinel surveillance of invasive bacterial diseases (IBD) carried out by the WHO regional office for Europe in a number of countries in Europe (Ukraine, Belarus), Transcaucasia (Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia), Asia (Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan) in the period 2010-2017. 2893 samples of clinical material (CSF and blood) obtained from patients with the meningeal syndrome were studied by four diagnostic methods: cultural method, latex-agglutination test, immunochromatographic test (BinaxNOW), PCR (conventional and real-time), used to identify the following pathogens: Neisseria meningitidis, Streptococcus pneumoniae, Haemophilus influenzae. When identifying the causative agents of BM, PCR more effective than culture method is 5 times in detecting N. meningitidis; 3 times in the detection of S. pneumoniae; 4 times the detection of H. influenzae b. Latex-agglutination test and immunochromatographic test allow to increase the identification of pathogens of BM for N. meningitidis - by 35.6%; S. pneumoniae - by 67%; H. influenzae b - by 19.2%, it is possible to set them in the field and at the epidpoint if necessary. When working with clinical material from patients diagnosed with GBM, it is advisable for bacteriological laboratories to complement the culture method of microbiological diagnosis of latex-agglutination test, immunochromatographic test or PCR.
Keywords: Haemophilus influenzae b; Neisseria meningitides; PCR; Streptococcus pneumonia; WHO; immunochromatographic test; latex agglutination reaction; purulent bacterial meningitis; real-time PCR.