Laboratory life
Vitek machine speeds bacteria identification

by Glen Korstrom
Northern News Services

NNSL (Apr 08/98) - The Stanton Hospital microbiology lab's new $90,000 bacteria-testing machine makes Evelyn Smith's job a whole lot easier.

The 22-year lab veteran says the "Vitek" machine, bought by the Department of Health and Social Services and the Stanton Hospital Foundation, arrived in January.

Samples used to take overnight but now most tests can be done in four to six hours.

Vitek helps Smith to identify bacteria and determine which antibiotics prevent specific bacterial colonies from growing.

"It's been a big improvement," Smith says as she holds a dish of gummy red gel mottled with splotches of bacteria colonies.

To start bacteria tests, Smith extracts samples from little bottles containing stools, urine or sputum and scrapes bits onto gummy gel in petri dishes.

"You won't catch anything unless you get your face right in there," she says of the risk of catching diseases from the samples.

"It doesn't jump off the plate."

Smith, married to Don and the mother of 22-year-old Clayton and 20-year-old Ryan, smells the samples as part of her analysis to determine what bacteria is growing. Usually the smell wafts out as soon as she lifts off the plastic dish lid.

Once the bacteria is scraped on the gel, the five microbiology lab technicians incubate the dishes at room temperature overnight.

Then they examine colony growth on the different colored gels.

The red gel contains sheep's blood and pretty much all bacteria grows on it.

Gonorrhoea bacteria does not grow on the red gummy substance, but it does grow on brown gel, which also contains sheep's blood but the blood has broken down a bit and released cells.

Clear gel, loved by yeast bacteria, contains sugars among other ingredients while salmonella grows on the pink gel which contains bile salts and crystal violet.

Once the bacteria has grown, colonies are put in wells in a plastic carrying tray the size of a credit card. These cards are in the Vitek machine.

Biochemical liquid compounds in the wells turn different colors depending on what kind of bacteria is placed in them.

Other wells are filled with antibiotics and help determine what will impede growth.

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