Clinical metagenomics assessments improve diagnosis and outcomes in community-acquired pneumonia

Background: Identifying the causes of community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) is challenging due to the disease's complex etiology and the limitations of traditional microbiological diagnostic methods. Recent advances in next generation sequencing (NGS)-based metagenomics allow pan-pathogen detection in a single assay, and may have significant advantages over culture-based techniques. Results: We conducted a cohort study of 159 CAP patients to assess the diagnostic performance of a clinical metagenomics assay and its impact on clinical management and patient outcomes. When compared to other techniques, clinical metagenomics detected more pathogens in more CAP cases, and identified a substantial number of polymicrobial infections. Moreover, metagenomics results led to changes in or confirmation of clinical management in 35 of 59 cases; these 35 cases also had significantly improved patient outcomes. Conclusions: Clinical metagenomics could be a valuable tool for the diagnosis and treatment of CAP.

Automated summary

The study found that clinical metagenomics has significant advantages in the diagnosis and treatment of community-acquired pneumonia, being able to detect more pathogens and identify polymicrobial infections, and it helps improve patient outcomes.