Antifungal Assay HiVeg™ Agar

Principle And Interpretation

Fungal infections have been reported to have dramatically increased in the past decade, and these often occur as systemic infections or as co-infections with other diseases, such as AIDS or cancer, or in patients who are immunocompromised (1,2). Unfortunately, in addition to the limited number of antifungal drugs currently available, fungal infections tend to rapidly develop resistance to these drugs. For these reasons, fungal infections now show much higher mortality rates than bacterial infections (3). The rapid increase in fungal infections and the growing number of new antifungal agents indicate an increasing need for rapid and accurate methods for antifungal screening and susceptibility testing. Antifungal Assay HiVeg Agar is the modification of Antifungal Assay Agar which was formulated by Berger and Lazecka for convenience in assaying antifungal activity of pharmaceutical products and other materials by both base and seed layers for assays by cylinder plate or disc methods.

The medium is prepared by using HiVeg hydrolysate in place of Casein enzymic hydrolysate which makes the medium free of BSE/TSE risks. The defined ingredients in the medium provide the necessary nutrients and growth factors required for the development of the test culture. Phosphate is included in this medium for good buffering action. Dextrose in the medium serves as a carbon and energy source. Other ingredients like the sulphates; vitamins, growth factors etc are added to enhance the growth of the test organisms, so that the inhibition obtained is always due to the antifungal agents and not due to nutrient depletion.