Recently Ahmed et al. reported two reproducible assays for measurement of the susceptibility of
M. mycetomatis isolates to antifungal agents: an adapted protocol based on the NCCLS (M38-A) guidelines and a viability-based XTT assay for facilitating end point reading (
2). Both test systems appeared reproducible and sensitive but were also time-consuming. For routine use, a system for testing susceptibility to antifungal agents should be cheap, fast, and easy to interpret. Recently, the YeastOne Sensititre system for determination of the susceptibilities of several yeast and fungal species, such as
Candida spp.,
Crytococcus spp., and
Aspergillus spp., to antifungal agents has been introduced (
4,
6,
20,
23,
27,
30). In this system, the MIC end points can be determined visually because of the dye Alamar blue, which is converted from blue to red when fungal growth occurs (
4,
6,
20,
23,
27,
30). Various studies show that the MICs obtained for several yeasts by the Sensititre system were in good agreement with those obtained by the NCCLS method (
4,
6,
20). However, for
Aspergillus spp. there was less agreement between the two methods (
23,
27). To investigate the value of the Sensititre system for
M. mycetomatis isolates, in the present study this system was compared to the modified NCCLS method and the XTT assay (
2). Good agreement was found between MICs obtained by the Sensititre method and the modified NCCLS method. Overall, the MICs obtained by the Sensititre method were equal to, or 1 dilution lower than, the MICs obtained by the modified NCCLS method. Findings of lower MICs with the Sensititre system have also been reported for other fungal species, such as
Cryptococcus neoformans and
Aspergillus spp. (
6,
27). Although we found lower MICs, the difference was not statistically significant. The discrepancies between the Sensititre system and the XTT test were higher. This may be explained by the fact that the indicator systems in the two tests were different (
17,
21). The discrepancies between the Sensititre system and the XTT test were highest for the azoles. This suggests that the trailing end point effect, usually obtained with azoles, is measured more effectively with XTT than with Alamar blue.
In the present study, the antifungal susceptibilities of 36
M. mycetomatis isolates to ketoconazole, itraconazole, fluconazole, voriconazole, amphotericin B, and flucytosine were determined by using the Sensititre method. For two of the strains MICs could not be determined, because these strains did not grow in the test medium in the presence of Alamar blue. Jahn et al. encountered the same problem when testing isolates of
Aspergillus fumigatus. They found strain-dependent differences which could not easily be explained (
17). In the present study, both ketoconazole and itraconazole appeared to be very effective at inhibiting the
M. mycetomatis strains. For both antifungal agents, only low concentrations were needed to inhibit 90% of the clinical isolates: 0.125 and 0.064 μg/ml, respectively. The MICs found for these two antifungal agents correlate with attainable levels in serum (
5). Ketoconazole was one of the first antifungal agents used in the treatment of eumycetoma caused by
M.
mycetomatis; more recently, itraconazole has been used as well (
21,
22,
24). Although some clinical studies showed that ketoconazole and itraconazole resulted in complete cure, the clinical response to these agents is often poor (
2,
21,
22,
24). This may be partially explained by the observed variation in MICs for the
M. mycetomatis isolates. Fluconazole was less effective than ketoconazole and itraconazole at inhibiting fungal growth. Fluconazole MICs were high for two isolates (>64 μg/ml), while those for the other isolates ranged from 0.125 to 16 μg/ml. Although these MICs are high, they still correlate with physiologically attainable levels in serum (
5,
11)
. Voriconazole, a relatively new azole that is highly effective against aspergillosis, showed similarly high antifungal activity against the
M. mycetomatis strains compared with ketoconazole and itraconazole (
13)
. Amphotericin B appeared to be less effective than ketoconazole, itraconazole, and voriconazole at inhibiting
M. mycetomatis. This observation is in accordance with the study performed by Ahmed et al. (
2). They also found that amphotericin B was less effective than itraconazole at inhibiting
M. mycetomatis; for 33% of the isolates, amphotericin B MICs exceeded the attainable peak levels of the drug in plasma (
2). Of all the antifungal agents tested in the present study, flucytosine was the least effective. Even at high concentrations, no fungal inhibition was noticed. The
M. mycetomatis isolates appeared to be resistant to flucytosine, which is also the case for many other filamentous fungi (
1,
12,
14,
19,
28).
In conclusion, the Sensititre YeastOne system is an appropriate system for determination of the susceptibility of M. mycetomatis strains to antifungal agents. The fungus was highly susceptible to ketoconazole, itraconazole, and voriconazole, moderately susceptible to fluconazole and amphotericin B, and resistant to flucytosine. The differences in MICs observed for the different M. mycetomatis isolates suggest that the introduction of routine testing of the susceptibility of M. mycetomatis isolates to antifungal agents is important for adequate therapeutic management.