TY - JOUR
T1 - Equal cryptococcus score 2018
T2 - A European confederation of medical mycology score derived from current guidelines to measure quality of clinical cryptococcosis management
AU - Spec, Andrej
AU - Mejia-Chew, Carlos
AU - Powderly, William G.
AU - Cornely, Oliver A.
N1 - Funding Information:
Potential conflicts of interest. All authors: no reported conflicts of interest. All authors have submitted the ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest. Conflicts that the editors consider relevant to the content of the manuscript have been disclosed.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2018.
PY - 2018/11/1
Y1 - 2018/11/1
N2 - Cryptococcocis is an opportunistic fungal infection with high morbidity and mortality. Guidelines to aid clinicians regarding diagnosis, management, and treatment can be extensive and challenging to comply with. There is no tool to measure guideline adherence. To create such a tool, we reviewed current guidelines from the Infectious Diseases Society of America, the World Health Organization, the American Society of Transplantation, and recent significant publications to select the strongest recommendations as vital components of our scoring tool. Items included diagnostic tests (blood, tissue, and cerebrospinal fluid cultures, Cryptococcus antigen, India ink, histopathology with special fungal stains, central nervous system imaging), pharmacological (amphotericin B, flucytosine, azoles) and nonpharmacological treatments (intracranial pressure management, immunomodulation, infectious disease consultation), and follow-up of central nervous system complications. The EQUAL Cryptococcus Score 2018 weighs and aggregates the recommendations for the optimal management of cryptococcosis. Providing a tool that could measure guideline adherence or facilitate clinical decision-making.
AB - Cryptococcocis is an opportunistic fungal infection with high morbidity and mortality. Guidelines to aid clinicians regarding diagnosis, management, and treatment can be extensive and challenging to comply with. There is no tool to measure guideline adherence. To create such a tool, we reviewed current guidelines from the Infectious Diseases Society of America, the World Health Organization, the American Society of Transplantation, and recent significant publications to select the strongest recommendations as vital components of our scoring tool. Items included diagnostic tests (blood, tissue, and cerebrospinal fluid cultures, Cryptococcus antigen, India ink, histopathology with special fungal stains, central nervous system imaging), pharmacological (amphotericin B, flucytosine, azoles) and nonpharmacological treatments (intracranial pressure management, immunomodulation, infectious disease consultation), and follow-up of central nervous system complications. The EQUAL Cryptococcus Score 2018 weighs and aggregates the recommendations for the optimal management of cryptococcosis. Providing a tool that could measure guideline adherence or facilitate clinical decision-making.
KW - Cryptococcus
KW - Fungal infection
KW - Guideline adherence
KW - Score
KW - Therapy
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85068075332&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1093/ofid/ofy299
DO - 10.1093/ofid/ofy299
M3 - Article
C2 - 30515434
AN - SCOPUS:85068075332
VL - 5
JO - Open Forum Infectious Diseases
JF - Open Forum Infectious Diseases
SN - 2328-8957
IS - 11
ER -