Prevalence of Pneumocystis jirovecii Colonization in Non-critical Immunocompetent COVID-19 Patients: A Single Center Prospective Study

• DOI: 10.20944/preprints202308.2206.v1
• Publication Date: 2023-09-01T08:32:37Z
• Authors: Antonio Riccardo ...; Giulio Viceconte; Ludovica Fusco; Marina Sarno; Isabella Di Filippo; Luca Fanasca; Paola Salvatore; Ivan Gentile
• Keywords: Pneumocystis pneumonia

BACKGROUND
 Pneumocystis jirovecii pneumonia (PJP) is an invasive fungal infection (IFI) that occurs mainly in immunocompromised hosts. As we observed a high prevalence of PCP as complication COVID-19 immunocompetent patients, conducted study to evaluate the P. colonization with PCR on oral washing samples (OWS) among non-immunocompromised and non-critical patients admitted for at our University Hospital.
 METHODS
 All over 18 years age Infectious Diseases Unit SARS-CoV-2 between July 2021 December 2022 were included. Patients undergoing mechanical ventilation or ECMO, those risk factors developing PCP, receiving prophylaxis excluded. Samples collected by gargling 10mL 0.9% NaCl day 14 hospital stay discharge.
 RESULTS
 Of 290 screened 59 (20%) met inclusion criteria enrolled. Only one (1.7%) resulted positive detection same patient was only develop follow up period.
 CONCLUSION
 Our results are line previous findings other studies confirmed very low OWS population. Despite limitation study, fact who tested cohort leads us reflect role this non-invasive sample predicting COVID-19.