Molecular approaches to diagnosis of invasive aspergillosis; what we know and what we do not know

Invasive aspergillosis (ia) is a major complication in immunocompromizedpatients where can be serious and rapidly fatal. early diagnosis and appropriateantifungal treatment is important in reducing mortality and morbidity. despitemany efforts to develop detection methods, the diagnosis of ia still remainschallenging and current conventional methods are limited for adequate diagnosis.new rapid methods which can detect ia early in the course of disease with highsensitivity and specificity are needed to treat these infections at an early stage.using molecular methods for the identification of aspergillus species can be acost-effective, rapid, discriminatory, and objective approach for delineatingaspergillus species in a clinical microbiology laboratory. pcr techniques for thediagnosis of ia have been studied for more than a decade and are still consideredinvestigational; however, until now pcr is not included in current eortc/msgdiagnostic criteria.