Use of MALDI-TOF MS technique for rapid identification of bacteria from positive blood cultures.

We evaluated the feasibility of same‑day routine aerobic bacterial identification using the following procedures: Picking colonies from 4 and 6 h incubated subculture from positive blood culture bottle and analyzing them by matrix‑assisted laser desorption/ionisation time‑of‑flight mass spectrometry (MALDI‑TOF MS). The matched identification rate of this procedure at the species level was 80.6% (141/175) for the 4‑h cultures compared with overnight cultures and 90.9% (159/175) for the 6‑h cultures. Thus, our technique provides an easy and rapid method for identification of aerobic bacteria in routine clinical microbiology laboratories.