Sputum Candida Culture Came Back Positive - Doctor Says It's Nothing To Worry About?

[ro.]

Hi guys,

I get a very thick coating on my tongue and have bad digestion so I wanted to check for candida. I got a sputum culture to check for candida - the doctor told me to cough up mucus from my throat but I couldn't cough any up. Instead I just scraped some of the coating from my tongue into the test tube. After being cultured the sample came back as positive for candida albicans. However, my doctor told me "The sputum candida is a contaminant and does not require treatment". Upon asking him to explain further he said "A contaminant refers to bacteria which artificially appear on sputum cultures when the sputum is brought up from the lung into the mouth. It is essentially a normal finding which does not need treatment."

Does anyone know if this is true? I guess what he's saying is candida is a normal resident in the mouth and it got caught up in the sputum which i was supposed to produce as i spat it into the test tube? If this is the case then wouldn't every sputum culture that comes back as positive be a "contaminant" as it's almost impossible for the sputum not to touch the mouth?

FWIW I also got candida IGM, IGG and IGA antibodies which came back as negative. Also, if it makes a difference, I also got a SIBO breath test done a couple of months ago which showed "mild SIBO with a high level of colonic fermentation"

Thanks

 

[Blossom]

Does anyone know if this is true? I guess what he's saying is candida is a normal resident in the mouth and it got caught up in the sputum which i was supposed to produce as i spat it into the test tube? If this is the case then wouldn't every sputum culture that comes back as positive be a "contaminant" as it's almost impossible for the sputum not to touch the mouth?

I believe it is true. The sputum always touches the oral cavity on the way out unless it is suctioned directly from the lungs. I've been dealing with sputum samples for years and the lab reports always identify which microbes come from the lungs versus which are from the oral cavity. Candida in a certain amount is a part of the normal oral flora.
ETA- you can certainly look into ways to decrease the amount of Candida in your mouth if it is bothering you.

 

[Blossom]

This link might be helpful
oral thrush getting worse on this diet

 

[ro.]

Thanks Blossom, I ordered some flowers of sulfur a few hours ago :)

Do you know how they are able to distinguish candida from the mouth vs the throat/lungs?

 

[Blossom]

Thanks Blossom, I ordered some flowers of sulfur a few hours ago :)

Do you know how they are able to distinguish candida from the mouth vs the throat/lungs?

No, I don't work in a lab but I've seen it specified so many times on reports that I know they have there ways. I've even witnessed several people spit in a container when they couldn't produce sputum and it's always come back correctly on follow up as oral flora. Maybe we have a lab savvy person here who knows how they do it?