In this symposium, how clinical laboratory doctors can contribute to diagnosis and management of infectious diseases will be discussed. A case of community-acquired pneumonia that was finally diagnosed as Legionella infection is presented, and the etiology and pathogenesis of pneumonia is discussed from the perspective of a clinical laboratory doctor. Community-acquired pneumonia(CAP) remains an important infectious disease, not only in developing countries but also in developed countries including Japan. Accumulating epidemiological data demonstrated that Streptococcus pneumonia remains a leading cause of CAP, followed by atypical pathogens, such as Legionella, Mycoplasma and Chlamydia. Recent progress in diagnostic methods has facilitated the rapid diagnosis of these infections by PCR and antigen detection. Especially, urinary antigen detection kits for S. pneumonia and L. pneumophila became available recently and these have proven to be convenient and reliable. Clinical laboratory doctors may contribute to the clinical side by providing these kinds of new information, such as epidemiology, diagnosis and antimicrobial chemotherapy. In addition, construction of reliable relationships between clinical doctors and clinical laboratory doctors may be prerequisite for efficient contribution of the laboratory side.


*Department of Microbiology, Toho University School of Medicine, Ohta-ku, Tokyo 143-8540

【Key Words】community-acquired pneumonia, Legionella pneumonia, Strep-tococcus pneumoniae pneumonia, urinary antigen