LTC patients are liable to various infections due to altered immune and anatomical barriers. We aimed to identify the correlation of bacteriologi­cal and clinical findings of the URT represented by nasal and oropha-ryngeal swabs, in addition to clinical examination, and their impact on LRT infection. We found that LTC patients are prone to abnormal pathogens in a unique pattern, and that LRT infection is associated with very high incidence of swabs positive for uncommon pathogens from the URT.