How to: interpret MICs of antifungal compounds according to the revised clinical breakpoints v. 10.0 European committee on antimicrobial susceptibility testing (EUCAST)

BACKGROUND: EUCAST has revised the definition of the susceptibility category "I" from "Intermediate" to "Susceptible, Increased exposure". This implies that "I" can be used where the drug-concentration at the site of infection is high, either because of dose escalation or through other means to ensure efficacy. Consequently, "I" is no longer used as a buffer-zone to prevent technical factors from causing misclassifications and discrepancies in interpretations. Instead, an "Area of Technical Uncertainty" (ATU) has been introduced for MICs that cannot be categorised without additional information as a warning to the laboratory that decision on how to act has to be made. To implement these changes, the EUCAST-AFST (Subcommittee on Antifungal Susceptibility Testing) reviewed all, and revised some, clinical antifungal breakpoints. OBJECTIVES: To present an overview of the current antifungal breakpoints and supporting evidence behind the changes. SOURCES: This document is based on the 10 recently updated EUCAST rationale documents, clinical breakpoint and breakpoint-ECOFF documents. CONTENT: The following breakpoints (in mg/L) have been revised or established for Candida species: micafungin against C. albicans (ATU=0.03); amphotericin B (S≤/>R=1/1), fluconazole (S≤/>R=2/4), itraconazole (S≤/>R=0.06/0.06), posaconazole (S≤/>R=0.06/0.06) and voriconazole (S≤/>R=0.06/0.25) against C. dubliniensis; fluconazole against C. glabrata (I≤/>R=16/32); and anidulafungin (S≤/>R=4/4) and micafungin (S≤/>R=2/2) against C. parapsilosis. For Aspergillus, new or revised breakpoints include: itraconazole (ATU=2) and isavuconazole against A. flavus (S≤/>R=1/2, ATU=2); amphotericin B (S≤/>R=1/1), isavuconazole (S≤/>R=1/2, ATU=2), itraconazole (S≤/>R=1/1, ATU=2), posaconazole (ATU=0.25) and voriconazole (S≤/>R=1/1, ATU=2) against A. fumigatus; itraconazole (S≤/>R=1/1, ATU=2) and voriconazole (S≤/>R=1/1, ATU=2) against A. nidulans; amphotericin B against A. niger (S≤/>R=1/1); and itraconazole (S≤/>R=1/1, ATU=2) and posaconazole (ATU=0.25) against A. terreus. IMPLICATIONS: EUCAST-AFST has released 10 new documents summarising existing and new breakpoints and MIC-ranges for control strains. A failure to adopt the breakpoint changes may lead to misclassifications and sub-optimal or inappropriate therapy of patients with fungal infections.

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