Fungemia observations of peripheral tissue clearance in humans.

Patients with fungemia, mainly due to Candida albicans, had cultures repeated from arterial and venous sites to determine yeast cell clearance during fungemia. Of the 48 patients, 37 had repeat positive cultures (36 arterial and venous samples; one venous culture). Additionally, 24 patients had arterial and venous samples cultured quantitatively. An average of 9.1 colony forming units (CFU) ml-1 was isolated from arterial samples and 5.5 CFU ml-1 from venous samples (60% of arterial, P < 0.01). This suggest that arterial fungal densities exceed venous densities and that peripheral tissues clear 40% of yeasts.