Rapid detection of cytomegalovirus in bronchoalveolar lavage specimens by a monoclonal antibody method.

Cytomegalovirus (CMV), a common cause of pneumonia in immunocompromised subjects, is conventionally diagnosed in the laboratory by tube cell culture assays or by detection of characteristic inclusions in histologic sections. Of 160 immunocompromised patients, CMV infection was diagnosed in 19 subjects by bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL), using a monoclonal antibody directed against an early nuclear antigen of the virus. Cytospin preparations from BAL and MRC-5 cell cultures inoculated with the BAL specimens yielded positive results for 6 (31.6%) and 18 (94%) of the 19 subjects, respectively, within hours of the bronchoscopic procedure, whereas conventional tube cell cultures were positive for 11 of the 19 subjects (57.9%) only after an average of 9.3 days. The monoclonal antibody method permitted easy and rapid detection of CMV in BAL specimens.