OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the usefulness and sensitivity of bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) as compared to sputum culture for the isolation of specific microorganism among adult patients seen at Iloilo Mission Hospital, tertiary hospital in Iloilo City, Philippines.METHODS: This is a retrospective comparative evaluation of culture isolates obtained from sputum and BAL taken from 34 adult patients who underwent bronchoscopy at the Iloilo Mission Hospital from January 2006- September 2007.RESULTS: Pseudomonas Aeruginosa are the most frequent isolated organism in bronchoalveolar lavage. Majority of the sputum culture reVealed no growth of microorganism on final report. Sputum specimens are frequently contaminated by upper respiratory tract bacteria such as Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus pneumoniae, Haemophilus influenzae, enteric gram negative bacteria, and Candida organisms, which are potential lower respiratory tract pathogens. This study shows that there is a significant increase in the number of patients who were found positive with microbial growth culture isolate using BAL. It was noted that 32 out of 34 patients had positive growth culture on BAL as compared with only 23 out of 34 patients had growth of isolate on sputum culture.CONCLUSION: BAL collection provides more definite culture isolate information for characterizing Pseudomonas Aeruginosa infection and growth isolates in which the sputum culture failed to report. This suggests that bronchoscopy specimens are preferable over sputum for the accurate diagnosis of pulmonary infections.
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