TY - JOUR T1 - Molecular diagnosis of the central nervous system (CNS) infections JO - Enfermedades Infecciosas y Microbiología Clínica T2 - AU - Vila,Jordi AU - Bosch,Jordi AU - Muñoz-Almagro,Carmen SN - 0213005X M3 - 10.1016/j.eimc.2020.03.001 DO - 10.1016/j.eimc.2020.03.001 UR - https://www.elsevier.es/es-revista-enfermedades-infecciosas-microbiologia-clinica-28-articulo-molecular-diagnosis-central-nervous-system-S0213005X20301683 AB - Central nervous system (CNS) infections such as meningitis and encephalitis are medical emergencies that require rapid diagnosis of the causative pathogen to guide early and adequate treatment since a delay in implementing an adequate antimicrobial therapy can lead to death. The current microbiological diagnostic methods based on culture or antigen detection have important limitations in their capacity to accurately identify the different potential pathogens causing CNS and, in the time, to obtaining results. Rapid syndromic molecular arrays have been developed. The main advantage of using a meningoencephalitis panel based in a multiplex test is that includes bacteria, viruses and fungi, covering the most prevalent microorganisms causing meningitis and encephalitis and the turn-around time is circa 1h. The use of these multiplex-PCR based tools is reviewed and the advantages and disadvantages of this technique are discussed. ER -