Increased detection rate for varicella-zoster virus with combination of two techniques.

Standard cell culture and centrifugation culture were compared for the isolation of varicella-zoster virus from 337 clinical specimens. Of a total of 85 (25%) positive specimens, 67 (78.8%) were positive by centrifugation culture alone and 18 (21.2%) were positive by both methods. When epithelial cells from the specimen were included in the vial inoculum, these cells stained positive and increased the varicella-zoster virus detection rate by 30%.