Assessment of microbiological diagnostic procedures for respiratory specimens from cystic fibrosis patients in German laboratories by use of a questionnaire.

Respiratory specimens from cystic fibrosis (CF) patients challenge microbiological laboratories with their complexity of pathogens and atypical variants. We evaluated the diagnostic procedures in German laboratories by use of a questionnaire. Although most laboratories followed guidelines, some of them served only a small number of patients, while others did not use the recommended selective agars to culture the particular CF-relevant species.