David S. Lindsay <lindsayd at vt.edu> wrote:
>A fecal flotation using centrifugation takes about 20 minutes to conduct
>and another 10 minutes to read. Therefor, time should not be a factor.
>Any ideas on why this procedure is not done in human parasitology? Is
>the fear of airbore pathogens a possible reason for not doing a
>flotation. Capped centrifuge tubes would prevent airbore pathogens.
>Fecal flotation with and without centrifugation is common in veterinary
>parasitology.
I work with Cyclospora in environmental waters. I've looked at flotation
as a means of further purifying them. One of the problems is that the
oocysts tend to stick to bits of debris and sink - not to mention that
they tend to sink on their own.
The best way to identify them (right now) is to do a wet mount silde
and view it under UV. They autofluoresce very nicely and you can
switch to bright field to id internal structures. The acid-fast stain
is inconsistant though there is a modified boiling safranin stain
(Vishevera, CDC) that works much better.
joan
--
Joan Shields jshields at uci.eduhttp://www.ags.uci.edu/~jshields
University of California - Irvine School of Social Ecology
Department of Environmental Analysis and Design
I do not purchase services or products from unsolicited e-mail advertisements.