Comparable Detections of Viral Pathogens in Lower Respiratory Tract Specimens with the BioFire Respiratory Panel 2 and the BioFire Pneumonia Panel.

Abstract

Multiplex PCR panels are powerful tools for rapid pathogen identification in patients with respiratory tract (RT) infections (1–6). In particular, analysis of upper respiratory tract (URT) specimens with the BioFire Respiratory Panel 2 (BRP2), which primarily targets viruses, decreases time to pathogen detection, duration of antibiotic use, and hospital length of stay (7, 8). In addition, many clinical laboratories have validated the BRP2 on lower respiratory tract (LRT) specimens (9, 10). Recently, the BioFire Pneumonia Panel (BPN) was shown to accurately identify viruses as well as a broader array of bacteria in LRT specimens (11, 12). Clinical laboratories must now determine if the BRP2 or the BPN or both should be included in the test menu for LRT specimens, but data comparing of these assays in this context are not available. Here, we evaluate the performance of the BRP2 and the BPN on LRT samples from adults at a tertiary care academic medical center.