Bone marrow transplantation was performed on 68 patients with severe hematologic disorders and solid tumors on the total protective environment program using laminar-airflow isolation and decontamination procedures. Patients were evaluated for infection acquisition while isolated. Sixty-four patients (94%) became febrile after the conditioning treatment, but evidence of infection proved absent in 23 (36%) of them. Viral infection occurred in 30 patients (44%), bacterial infection in 17 patients (25%), and fungal infection in 1 patient (1%). The infectious complications included orolabial herpes simplex (28 patients), septicemia (11 patients), local catheter infection (6 patients), anoperineal cellulitis and periodontitis (5 patients each), viral interstitial pneumonia (3 patients), and herpes zoster, bacterial pneumonia, and dacryocystitis (1 patient each). The most common causative bacteria, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Staphylococcus epidermidis, tended to be isolated as a monoflora or a pure culture from the throat and/or stool or infection sites just before or at the onset of fever. Five patients (7%) died of infection while isolated. Anoperineal cellulitis with or without bacteremia proved fatal in 4 patients, of whom 3 had become febrile within the 2 weeks before transplant. It was, thus, suggested that the strict enforcement of prophylactic measures based on the results of surveillance cultures may be associated with a reduced incidence of septicemia, hence reduced mortality. In addition, it was stressed that scrutiny of residual infections such as seen in periodontal and anorectal areas before transplant will reduce serious bacterial infection soon after transplant.

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A device for mechanical dilution and application of specimens and counting microbial colonies was developed. The device consists of a transport apparatus which transports petri dishes from one side of the apparatus to the other in such a way that the plate and lid of petri dishes are entirely separated at a particular stage. A diluting and inoculating system performs 10-fold dilutions of specimens from 10^-1 to 10^-8 dilutions and inoculation of the diluents. The inoculum is applied to the agar surface of preselected petri plates by an application system. Both a diluting and inoculating system and an application system can be connected to the apparatus. In this way a maximum of 25 agar plates can be handled. This new automatic system for enumeration of colony-forming units by the surface plate method is more accurate and reliable than the customary conventional methods.

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Bacteria elaborating glycosyltransferase (GT) which produce polysaccharide or oligosaccharide from sucrose were surveyed from the feces of humans and animals. Three isolates having strong GT activity were obtained from animal feces. Strain F3-33 obtained from a common marmoset was identified as Bifidobacterium animalis, strain L2-13 obtained from a ruffed lemur was identified as Lactobacillus reuteri, and strain D2-38 obtained from a prairie dog was identified as Lactobacillus sp.

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The reliability of the Microring AN for the presumptive identification of non-sporeforming anaerobes was evaluated using 32 stock cultures. The Microring AN provides a simple and rapid method for the primary and presumptive identification of non-sporeforming anaerobes at the bacterial group level, but not at the species level. At the same time, the results give therapeutic information.

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