Staining of Pneumocystis carinii in Lung Imprints

Excerpt

To the editors: Of relevance to the recent paper of Macher and coworkers (1) on Pneumocystis carinii identified by Gram stain of lumg imprints is a case of a male narcotic addict recently seen by us in whom a diagnosis of pneumocystis pneumonia was made by the method described and was confirmed by conventional stains of both lung imprints and lung tissue. In addition to the Gram staining, the cysts could be stained with Kinyoun acid-fast basic fuschin or methylene blue.

Thus, P. carinii may be visible on slides of lung imprints stained with many of the stains a clinician