Early identification and isolation of tuberculosis patients is of utmost importance to minimize the risk of further epidemic spread of the disease. The traditional concentrated acid-fast smears are not very reliable tools for the presumptive diagnosis of tuberculosis. Acid-fast bacillus (AFB) smears from 120 patients specimens and 80 simulated AFB samples were processed according to standard la...

OBJECTIVE There are no rules to predict the time to infectivity negative conversion based on sputum smear conversion or culture conversion during chemotherapy in smear-positive tuberculosis patients. We aimed to develop and validate rules of sputum smear grades and cavitations in the lungs due to tuberculosis. METHODS This study was a retrospective cohort study that consisted of development (...

Although it is not rare to find sputum that is positive acid-fast bacilli (AFB) smear but subsequent culture fails to isolate mycobacteria in clinical practice, the incidence and clinical implication of those sputa from new patients has not been clearly elucidated. The aim of this study was to determine the incidence and clinical implication of sputum with positive AFB smear but negative in myc...

BACKGROUND Sputum concentration increases the sensitivity of smear microscopy for the diagnosis of tuberculosis (TB), but few studies have investigated this method in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected individuals. METHODS We performed a prospective, blinded evaluation of direct and concentrated Ziehl-Neelsen smear microscopy on a single early-morning sputum sample in HIV-infected pa...

BACKGROUND The objective of this study is to describe the proportion of patients with chronic cough and negative smear microscopy appropriately diagnosed as tuberculosis (TB) and to identify clinical features that could be used in developing a diagnostic scoring system for smear-negative patients. METHODS Records of patients with chronic cough and ≥ 3 negative sputum smears for acid fast baci...

Sir—We read with great interest the study by Sacks et al. [1] regarding the use of adjunctive salvage therapy with inhaled aminoglycosides for the treatment of patients with persistent smear-positive pulmonary tuberculosis (TB). We would like to stress that such treatment may be microbiologically and also clinically effective in patients with refractory abscessed and cavitary pulmonary TB. In 1...

Sputum smear microscopy is widely used for tuberculosis diagnosis and treatment monitoring. We evaluated the correlation between smear microscopy and time to liquid culture positivity during early tuberculosis treatment. The study included patients with smear-positive pulmonary tuberculosis hospitalized at a tuberculosis reference centre in Germany between 01/2012 and 05/2013. Patient records w...

A selective medium with DNase test agar and incorporating vancomycin (10 micrograms/ml), trimethoprim (8 micrograms/ml), and amphotericin B (2 micrograms/ml) supported the growth of 305 Branhamella catarrhalis isolates. A modified toluidine blue O technique was used after 48 h of incubation in CO2 to overlay suspected B. catarrhalis colonies. A metachromatic color change was observed in 15 min,...

INTRODUCTION Tuberculous (TB) synovitis is a rare, treatable, potentially lethal form of extrapulmonary TB resulting from massive lymphohematogenous dissemination of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M. tuberculosis). We presented a case of TB synovitis of the knee in a Caucasian HIV-negative man from Romania, a high TB incidence country. CASE REPORT A 65-year old man presented with cough, high fev...

The criteria for admission are extended for the cases of the risk of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (TB) transmission and of the possible risk of treatment failure. The criteria for discharging are consisted of the 3 factors, (1) symptoms (cough, fever, etc.) are free after the standard chemotherapy of more than 2 weeks, (2) three different sputum smears are negative for acid-fast bacilli (AFB) aft...