Publication date: Jan 31, 2025
The COVID-19 pandemic has had impact on global healthcare and respiratory disease patterns. The aim was to evaluate the changes in positive respiratory cultures during the pandemic. A retrospective analysis of respiratory specimens in Papanikolaou Hospital during 2018-2023 was performed. In total, 18,852 samples (12,277 males, 6575 females) of respiratory samples were recorded. During 2018-2019, 684 BAL samples were received, of which 12. 3 % were positive. Positive pharyngeal smears constituted 24. 8 %, compared to 18. 5 % in pandemic years, and 29. 6 % in 2023. In PTC, pre-pandemic, positives were 12. 3 %, while in 2021 the maximum percentage of positives (21. 9 %) was observed. Positive levels remained high in 2023 (18. 3 %). Concerning bronchial secretions, there was an increase (55. 3 % in 2022 vs 47. 0 % in 2019). The predominant bacteria were Acinetobacter spp, Klebsiella spp and Pseudomonas spp. Except for the bronchial secretions, the rest of the respiratory specimens do not exhibit any definite trends.
| Concepts | Keywords |
|---|---|
| Bacterial | COVID-19 epidemiology |
| Greece | Respiratory cultures |
| Healthcare | SARS-CoV-2 |
| Pandemic | Secondary bacterial infections |
Semantics
| Type | Source | Name |
|---|---|---|
| disease | MESH | respiratory tract infections |
| disease | MESH | pandemic COVID-19 |
| drug | DRUGBANK | Dimercaprol |
| disease | IDO | bacteria |
| disease | MESH | bacterial infections |