Sputum Culture Test

What is this test?

Sputum culture and sensitivity is a technique predominantly used to test the sensitivity of the aerobic bacteria, which can infect lungs in the human body. This test is done on both males and females to find out whether the lungs are infected by a bacteria or not and to find the cause for lower respiratory tract infection.

What is Sputum?

Sputum is a mixture of saliva and mucus that is coughed up from the respiratory tract due to an infection in the lungs by a bacteria.

What are Bacteria, Aerobic Bacteria, and their types?

Bacteria are the single-celled micro-organisms that can live within the soil, in the ocean and also inside the human gut. They have a number of shapes such as spirals, rods, and spheres etc. Some bacteria can cause illness to the human body and some other plays a major role in the overall functioning of our ecosystem.

Aerobic bacteria are the bacteria which can survive in the presence of oxygen only. In the absence of oxygen, aerobic bacteria cannot survive and can die. Some of the aerobic bacteria are Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Nocardia, Staphylococcus aureus, Enterococcus faecalis etc.

Why this test is performed?

This test is performed to check if an individual's lungs are infected by an aerobic bacteria or not. This test may be recommended to you by a physician if you experience symptoms such as a dry cough, low-grade fever, sore throat, severe cough, headache, wheezing, chest pain, difficulty in breathing, chills, loss of appetite etc. This test is performed to identify the cause of bacterial pneumonia and lower respiratory tract infections.

This test also helps the doctors to plan the treatment according to the type of bacteria, that infects the lungs. The test is also recommended by a physician to check the effectiveness of the treatment.

Also known as C/S Aerobic Sputum, Culture Aerobic Sputum.