Mini-Lab—MSF's simplified bacteriology laboratory for low-resource settings

Resistance to antibiotics is a growing public health crisis, especially in countries with fragile health systems and in regions at war. One key limitation in most of these settings is a lack of clinical bacteriology laboratory capacity, which leaves medical providers without ways to accurately diagnose patient infections and to tailor antibiotic treatment accordingly.

To help fill this critical gap, MSF and partners have developed the Mini-Lab—a small-scale, standalone lab that is easy to transport, set up and operate by staff after only a short training. Its six modules are stocked with everything needed to diagnose common bloodstream and urinary tract infections and to perform antibiotic sensitivity testing using methods adapted to extremely hot climates and remote settings.

With Mini-Lab now being rolled out to selected MSF projects, here we highlight the background to its development and some of the research behind the bacteriological tests it incorporates.

Collection Content

Journal Article

Research

Ronat JB, Oueslati S, Natale A, Kesteman T, Elamin W, et al.

2022-08-30 • Diagnostics

Easy and robust antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST) methods are essential in clinical bacteriology laboratories (CBL) in low-resource settings (LRS). We evaluated the Beckman Coul...

Journal Article

Research

Ombelet S, Natale A, Ronat JB, Kesteman T, Vandenberg O, et al.

2021-12-13 • Lancet Microbe

BACKGROUND
Manual blood culture bottles (BCBs) are frequently used in low-resource settings. There are few BCB performance evaluations, especially evaluations comparing them with aut...

Journal Article

Review

Ronat JB, Natale A, Kesteman T, Andremont A, Elamin W, et al.

2021-10-01 • Clinical Microbiology and Infection

BACKGROUND
In low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), data related to antimicrobial resistance (AMR) are often inconsistently collected. Humanitarian, private and non-governmental ...

Conference Material

Video

Ronat JB

2021-08-25 • MSF Scientific Days Asia 2021

Journal Article

Research

Ombelet S, Natale A, Ronat JB, Vandenberg O, Hardy L, et al.

2021-02-19 • Diagnostics

Bacterial identification is challenging in low-resource settings (LRS). We evaluated the MicroScan identification panels (Beckman Coulter, Brea, CA, USA) as part of Médecins Sans Frontiè...

Journal Article

Commentary

Natale A, Ronat JB, Mazoyer A, Rochard A, Boillot B, et al.

2020-06-01 • Lancet Microbe

Journal Article

Commentary

Kanapathipillai R, Malou N, Hopman J, Bowman C, Yousef N, et al.

2019-04-10 • Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has designed context-adapted antibiotic resistance (ABR) responses in countries across the Middle East. There, some health systems have been severely damag...

Journal Article

Commentary

Ombelet S, Ronat JB, Walsh T, Yansouni CP, Cox J, et al.

2018-03-05 • Lancet Infectious Diseases

Low-resource settings are disproportionately burdened by infectious diseases and antimicrobial resistance. Good quality clinical bacteriology through a well functioning reference laborat...

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Diabetes affect hundreds of millions of people worldwide, a large majority of them living in low- and middle-income countries. Yet finding effective strategies, tools and policies for effectively managing this chronic illness—especially amid war, displacement or exclusion from care—is a neglected area of humanitarian medicine. Here we present a cross-section of work on this front by MSF and collaborators. Several studies assess the shift towards community-based, nurse-led models of care in rural settings. Others explore obstacles to diabetes care for war refugees living in camps in Jordan or Lebanon, highlighting how health programs can adapt to their needs. The demonstration that insulin retains potency for 30 days if cooled without refrigeration is opening doors to more patient self-management, as a case study in remote South Sudan shows. At the same time, MSF and others call for regulatory and financing policies that make diabetes medications and supplies cheaper, better adapted to humanitarian settings, and far more available to patients whose lives depend on them.

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Science Portal

Collection Content

Validation of three MicroScan® antimicrobial susceptibility testing plates designed for low-resource settings

Biphasic versus monophasic manual blood culture bottles for low-resource settings: an in-vitro study

AMR in low-resource settings: Médecins Sans Frontières bridges surveillance gaps by developing a turnkey solution, the Mini-Lab

Development of an all-in-one transportable clinical bacteriology laboratory: Feedback from testing the MSF Mini-Lab development project in Haiti

Evaluation of MicroScan bacterial identification panels for low-resource settings

The Mini-Lab: accessible clinical bacteriology for low-resource settings

Antibiotic resistance in conflict settings: lessons learned in the Middle East

Clinical bacteriology in low-resource settings: today's solutions

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Prevalence and outcomes of antibiotic resistant infections at MSF projects

Antibiotic resistance, conflict and the Middle East

Diabetes care in humanitarian settings