European Committee on Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing (EUCAST) is a scientific committee for defining guidelines to interpret antimicrobial resistance. It was formed in 1997 and is jointly organized by ESCMID,

ECDC The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) is an agency of the European Union (EU) whose mission is to strengthen Europe's defences against infectious diseases. It covers a wide spectrum of activities, such as: surveillance, e ...

and other European laboratories. EUCAST guidelines are one of the most popular breakpoint guidelines used in antimicrobial susceptibility testing worldwide. The EUCAST guidelines are freely available to all of their users. Like the

Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute The Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) is a volunteer-driven, membership-supported, not-for-profit, standards development organization. CLSI promotes the development and use of voluntary laboratory consensus standards and guidelin ...

, EUCAST offers guidelines to interpret raw

minimum inhibitory concentration In microbiology, the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) is the lowest concentration of a chemical, usually a drug, which prevents visible ''in vitro'' cell growth, growth of bacteria or Fungus, fungi. MIC testing is performed in both diagnosti ...

s (MICs), the lowest concentration of a chemical, usually a drug, which prevents visible growth of bacterium. The interpretation to

antimicrobial resistance Antimicrobial resistance (AMR or AR) occurs when microbes evolve mechanisms that protect them from antimicrobials, which are drugs used to treat infections. This resistance affects all classes of microbes, including bacteria (antibiotic resista ...

(reported as "R") or antimicrobial susceptibility (reported as "S") differs for all bug-drug combinations which is why guidelines are needed.

References

Antimicrobial resistance organizations Biology in Europe {{Microbiology-stub