The evaluation of the efficiency of Atellica UAS800 in detecting pathogens (rod, cocci) causing urinary tract infection

Abstract Objectives Atellica UAS800 (Siemens Healthineers, Germany), an automatic microscopic analysis device, based on the principle of analyzing microscopic images with a digital camera, has the feature of discriminating pathogens such as cocci and rod apart from the complete urinalysis. We aimed to evaluate the usability of the Atellica UAS800 microscopic analyzer as a screening tool for identifying urinary pathogens by comparing it with the gold-standard urine culture method in our study. Methods A total of 1,056 urine samples between June 2022 and July 2022 in Ankara City Hospital were included. Atellica UAS800 was used for complete urinalysis. Simultaneous samples obtained for urine culture were processed in Walk Away Specimen Processor (WASP; Copan, Italy). After evaluating WASP, cultures with growth were identified by Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization Time-of-Flight, Mass Spectrometry (VITEK-MS; bioMerieux Diagnostics, France) device at the species level. Results Of the 1,056 urine samples, 551 (52.2 %) and 505 (47.8 %) were from male and female patients respectively. The ROC curve analysis of the 1,056 samples yielded AUC values of 0.743 and 0.865 for the detection of bacteria and rods, respectively. In the ROC curve analysis regarding gender, the AUC was found to be 0.772 and 0.867 in female patients and 0.693 and 0.859 in male patients in the detection of bacteria and rod respectively. Conclusions The Atellica UAS800 automatic microscopic analyzer has a high specificity of detecting gram-negative bacilli, which are responsible for approximately 50–90 % of UTIs and can guide clinicians in the empirical treatment of UTIs.