A REVIEW OF CURRENT IN-VITRO ANTIMICROBIAL SUSCEPTIBILITY TESTING METHODS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS

The increasing emergence of antimicrobial resistance and the failure of many currently available antimicrobials in combatting disease-causing pathogens have led to a surge in research by scientists to identify new and/or modify available compounds in order to have an upper hand in the battle against disease-causing pathogens. Various efforts have been geared toward obtaining bioactive compounds from natural sources but to test for their microbial susceptibility, antimicrobial susceptibility testing methods are relevant. Currently available conventional methods of susceptibility testing provide accurate and reliable results despite being slow, laborintensive, and time-consuming. Therefore, there is an increasing trend toward the integration of automated systems in susceptibility testing, which provides quicker results and is easy to use. This study reviews the current knowledge of the available methods of in vitro susceptibility testing, highlighting the advantages and limitations, the challenges with the use of automated systems, and areas to be focused on in future progress.