CS12.1 New tools for achieving tuberculosis control

New tools for achieving tuberculosis control: progress and reflexion.

Diagnostic Needs and Status of New Diagnostic Tools for Tuberculosis

More than 100 years after its invention, microscopic examination of sputum is still the only widely available diagnostic tool for tuberculosis in disease-endemic countries (DECs). The advantages of AFB microscopy are well known: it is inexpensive to perform, is very specific in high prevalence settings, and detects the most infectious subset of patients. For these reasons, microscopy rightly re...

Molecular diagnosis of tuberculosis: the need for new diagnostic tools.

The clinical value of new diagnostic tools for tuberculosis

Barriers to global tuberculosis (TB) control include multidrug resistance, HIV infection, and weak health systems. Case detection is critical to TB control and is affected by all three of these. Currently, most low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) rely on direct sputum smear microscopy for diagnosis. Modern culture methods and molecular tests, previously considered too complex or too expens...

Immunodiagnosis of tuberculosis: new questions, new tools conference 2008

Human infection with Mycobacterium tuberculosis exists as a spectrum of conditions ranging from asymptomatic infection to active disease. Novel, accurate tuberculosis immunodiagnostics have been introduced over the last decade, but it remains challenging to timely diagnose active disease and to accurately distinguish asymptomatic M. tuberculosis infection from immune memory resulting from a pri...