Candida Pneumonia in Critically Ill Patients?

Candida is often present in respiratory specimens of critically ill patients, but how often such findings reflect Candida pneumonia remains unclear. To investigate this issue, researchers in Belgium conducted postmortem examinations of the lungs of 232 patients who died in the ICU of their institution from October 2004 through September 2006.

Among the 135 patients with autopsy evidence of pneumonia, 30 died from pneumonia, 79 died from multiorgan failure and shock, and 26 died from other causes. Forty-two of the 135 patients were immunocompromised (neutropenic or treated with corticosteroids), and 11 had been treated with antifungal agents for conditions such as candidemia, Candida peritonitis, or aspergillosis. Seventy-seven patients had a…